


Show me your smile

by DestinyxDarkness



Series: The rebellion to the Alpha/Beta/Omega universe [1]
Category: Borderlands (Video Games), Mark Fischbach (Youtuber), Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF), Sean Mcloughlin (Youtuber)
Genre: Asphyxiation, Attempted Kidnapping, Attempted Murder, Canon-Typical Violence, Choking, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Gun Violence, Kidnapping, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Minor Character Death, Multi, Past Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Prostitution, Suicide Attempt, Therapy, Threats of Violence, Unresolved Emotional Tension
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-03-03 08:19:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 46,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13337169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DestinyxDarkness/pseuds/DestinyxDarkness
Summary: A world which is mostly ruled by the people of the world called "Alpha" seems to be looming overhead, causing chaos and unhappiness to loom over the universe. However, not all people are content with letting such a thing happen. A small group of people, led by a hot headed Alpha(Who wished to be anything else other than a Alpha) try to bring about a new wave of equality and fairness, meeting strange characters along the way.(Includes swearing, suggestive themes and violence) ©





	1. Rain soaked wood

**Begin phase one**  
  
Alpha. Beta. Omega.  
Three different kinds of class you could be born into, each being different in their own right. Everyone’s blood, which each of us carried around for our entire lives. It often shaped how you would think, how you could handle things compared to others.  
Red was the colour that was always associated with Alpha. Alpha are strong, tough, natural leaders who often ruled with iron fists and sheer will. However, this usually came at the cost of intelligence. I suppose you could call Alpha short term thinkers, not really planning for the future.  
Green was often associated with Beta. Beta were considered to be the middle of the road between the other two class types, not really particularly lacking a specific trait like the other two. If you were a Beta, you had a specific talent that you excelled at, regardless of body build or state of mind. They might be a body builder, but their talent could be knitting. It just depended on the persons luck.  
Blue, the final colour, was often associated with Omega. They were considered to be quite weak compared to every other class, due to their difficulty with building up muscle mass. On the other hand, they often were gifted with the intelligence of a master strategist or genius. This naturally didn't apply to all of them, but it was usually the case.  
Unfortunately, we as a species didn't work together as a harmonious existence. The whole entire bunch of them, all useless idiots.  
Most Alpha had decided that they deserved to be treated as the best; trampling the other two underneath as Alpha caused chaos and unhappiness everywhere.  
And due to the fact that they are a heck of a lot stronger, most people couldn't afford to stand against them.  
Most Omega were taken as slaves, while Beta got forced into doing what was classified as "menial" tasks.  
As such, unless you were surrounded by Alpha, Alpha are almost never trusted anywhere.  
Beta are the ones blamed for everything going wrong in society, because they were left with all the tasks that required the economy to keep running. The farmers, the tailors, the doctors. You name it; it was likely a Beta fulfilling the role.  
Omega are treated as pets, as well as servants. I am not even sure why Omega were treated that way; I just know that it was already considered to be the norm when I came of age.

As such, our world was already crumbling all around us as it was. But things get even worse when a week of heat comes along.  
Each month, every class has one week of heat, when we get hot and bothered, having the urge to bond with someone.  
It begins with Alpha at the first week of the month, then immediately after comes the Beta and follows with the Omega. We finally have a week at the end of the month that is blissfully empty of heat. But those weeks of heat are almost hazardous to endure, each of them coming with their own dangers.  
Alpha go absolutely crazy, pretty much jumping everything in sight.  
Beta shut themselves in their houses for the most part, trying to keep themselves safe when their scents would drive everyone crazy. Everything really goes to shit then, as the economy breaks down without all of the workers showing up to work.  
Omega get really, really horny, seeking out anyone to help them relieve themselves. They unfortunately get abused in that state, as they aren't really in the right state of mind to be able to tell people no, or to distinguish when something was alright. They just were horny, and that overtook all rational thinking.  
Every class hated their heat, even the Alpha. It causes everyone to lose their minds, to not be themselves.  
Some people take suppressants (Small little pills that would ensure that none of the weird emotions from our heat affected us), some get drunk, and some hide away until it is done.  
Either way, everybody hates their heat. Including me.

* * *

  
I rounded the corner of the dark alleyway, only to see someone getting beat up at the end of the street.  
I quickly did an about turn and started heading in the opposite direction, pulling my heavy black cloak tighter to my body in some sort of defence against my vulnerable feelings.  
 **Away from the fighting. Must get away from chaos. Away, away, away....**  
I found myself panting, the fever that I had built up over the last couple of days was really aggravating my headache.  
Of course my bloody heat had to come now, just when I needed to run away from him.  
I came to the desolate town of Hollow point on Pandora, it being one of the few towns where people were almost impossible to track.  
However, it was also filled with bandits, con-artists, psychopaths and pretty much anything bad.

I had learned a long time ago about how to hide my Alpha scent, but I was having increased difficulty doing so with my heat in full swing.  
Not to mention my suppressants had run out a couple of days ago. So that left me without anywhere to stay and without anything to stop my wild scent and emotions.  
I wouldn't put it past some idiot Alpha to try and take advantage of a female, regardless of her class.  
I was luckily only at the first stage of my heat, the fever ridden part.  
Better than the horny part, of course. Nothing good happened to people who didn't have somewhere to stay when that part of their heat swung around.  
I looked down the next alleyway, seeing a bar at the end of the street called the Purple Skag.  
Yeah, no thanks. Bars are bad places for anyone in their heat.  
Your scent, regardless of your class, becomes more intense in your heat, drawing all kinds of nasty folk towards yourself.  
Alpha don't emit their scent as much as Omega do, but it's definitely worse than Beta, who most average people could only smell when they are in their heat.  
Except for me. I was ever so lucky (Can you hear the sarcasm?) to gain a very sensitive nose, meaning I was drinking in all the scents from anyone around me.  
Alpha. Beta. Omega.  
Didn't matter who, I always had to be aware around people, otherwise I would go wild with their scent. My heat only seemed to make it twice as bad.  
The only thing that got rid of my super sensitive smell was the suppressants, as I couldn't smell anything when I took them.  
They also, however, feel like someone is banging on your head with a hammer while you have a pounding headache.  
Still better than being jumped/jumping someone in my opinion.  
The smells around me, my fever, my headache and my paranoia was making a horrid cocktail inside me, making me annoyed and very horny. Probably more angry, if you were to ask me at the time.  
The only thing distracting me was the sound of my boots creaking into the wooden floor beneath me and the squishing noise of my boots due to the fact they were wet. The town seemed to have developed a sort of wet fog in the cave it was in, the moisture remaining in the air rather than dissipating.

Ugh, I just really hoped I could find some place to stay soon.  
I raised my head once more, trying to keep an eye out for anywhere to stay. Motels seemed to be in short supply in this town.  
As I scanned in front of me beyond my hood, I spied another alleyway off to my left. I sighed, but decided to peek down it anyway due to my situation.  
No luck, that alleyway just ended up being another dead end. Just how many had that been in this last hour? I had honestly begun to lose count after the third one.  
This endless cycle seemed to continue for another 20 minutes, until I saw a sign on the wall to my left that gave me some hope.  
It was a sign belonging to a motel, the motel being called "Little hole in the wall". It was a quaint little motel, the entire thing made out of a gentle brown wood, polished nicely to a shine. Just like its name, the motel seemed to have been built into the cold stone wall, being pretty well hidden despite being attached to what I believe to be the main road in this town.  
I chuckled at the coincidence of the name, finding some sort of happiness from seeing the place in such a desolate town such as Hollow point. But all those happy emotions came crashing down, my lips twisting into a frown when I saw the big, blaring words on the front door.  
"NO ALPHA ALLOWED" the sign read, each letter in large block letters to accentuate their intention.  
It felt like a punch to my gut, not only because I thought I had finally found a place just to be let down, but also because the fact that I was an Alpha. Why was I being punished because other Alpha are mostly mindless idiots?!  
I delivered a kick to a nearby wooden post in annoyance, hearing the wood crack loudly with the force I delivered behind it.  
I apparently kicked it too hard because it went flying over a couple of houses nearby, landing with a loud splash into the lake that was situated in the middle of Hollow point.  
I let out a grumble, which came out as more of a growl. I had always wondered why our particular branch of humanity growled like we did, but I knew that it was particularly helpful for people to recognise when you were annoyed. And it would have been fair to say, that I felt so annoyed right then.  
I heard a clicking noise behind me, the noise reminding me of old fashioned locks that would click loudly whenever you tried to lock and unlock their mechanism. I immediately was curious about where this noise came from, turning around to see a person's head poking out from behind the door.  
A man had poked his head out from behind the door, his body features mostly being hidden away behind the door frame from my prying eyes. Despite the fact I had kicked a post, snapped it half and sent it into the lake nearby, he didn't seem that angry or afraid. I guess he didn't see me do any of that.  
If anything, his face was gentle and calm, looking at me with slightly concerned eyes. Dark brown eyes looked me up and down, but that wasn't what drew my eyes. Most of his hair seemed to be black, but a large portion on the top of his head seemed to have been dyed a bright shade of red. It was certainly attention grabbing.  
"Are you alright?" He asked me, his voice being the next thing to suddenly grab my attention from everything else.

It was deep, so deep. A rumble, that seemed to only intensify with how softly he spoke to me.

It would have even been a little bit intimidating if it wasn't for the fact it came across as gentle as well. Nothing in his mannerisms seemed to exhibit hostility, which seemed to sooth my intense anger from before.  
His eyes looked curiously at me up and down, seeing my soggy clothing and heavy breathing. I wasn't really runway material, let's put it that way.  
I winced involuntarily as I felt another wave of pain come on, and his eyes seemed to widen as I flinched behind my hood.  
"I need a place to stay the night" I mumbled through the pain, trying my best to not frighten the man. I sure as hell wasn't going to tell him my class or that I was in heat.  
I could see in his eyes that he didn't seem to trust me straight away, probably both from the fact I wasn't someone he recognised and my vague answer to his unspoken question. He took a little bit, his eyes desperately trying to figure out if I was going to be a danger to him.  
Nobody does, because I am a slight build and a female. I only got proven right; when he pulled the door wider open in a sort of invitation for me to some inside.  
"Quick, before an Alpha shows up"  
I nearly laughed at the irony in that statement, the thought crossing my mind to tell him at this moment just to get a kick out of his reaction. But that probably was a bad idea, so I let that thought slip by without a care in the world.  
Well, don't look a gift horse in the mouth Ally.  
"Thanks so much"


	2. Wolf in sheep's clothing

I heard the click of the door behind me, the man who had let me in shutting the door and probably locking it behind me. I would have felt paranoid in any different situation, but I took my chances already by coming in here. Throwing a fuss because the guy locked the door wouldn't do any good.  
It felt good to be out of the rain anyway. Well, rain is maybe the wrong word. Fog? Whatever.  
I took in a deep breath, which was supposed to lead into a sigh. Big mistake.  
My nostrils got assaulted by nearly twenty different scents at once, my body flaring up with adrenaline at the exciting new smells. I ended up gagging on the scents, covering my nose and mouth before looking for the source.  
In my hurry to get into the building, I hadn't noticed the amount of people that were residing in the foyer of the motel. I could have berated myself for the lack of thought that went through my brain, but I also could have argued about the fact that I was in my heat. Not to mention, we Alpha don't really plan ahead that far.  
About eight guys all looked at my drenched form, if you didn't count the guy who had let me in. About four really tall ones were on the stairs leading upstairs, while the other four stood at the foot of the stairs.  
Two of the men held up gasoline lamps, trying to illuminate the dark area. I tried to look at them all, but the sudden light of the gasoline lamps were so bright in contrast to outside that I only really got a burning pain in my eyes.  
All of them had their eyes trained on me, which didn't surprise me in the slightest.  
"Mark? Who's this?" said one with a strange accent which I couldn't place. Scottish or something.  
The man who had let me inside moved to stand along side the one who spoke to him. I guess that meant that his name was Mark.  
The lamp light helped me see Mark's face better, seeing his facial hair and glasses reflect the light from the lamp.

From what I could see of him, he looked pretty well built. Large broad shoulders, which then extended into burly arms. Heck, even his legs seemed to have gotten the same muscle mass as the rest of him. He looked like a stereotypical Alpha, except he was perfectly calm and didn't seem to have his heat at all.  
I found myself distracted with how he looked, his dark eyes and muscle physique really dragging my attention away from all of his companions. I guess it wouldn't really be lying to say that I found him really attractive.  
"She said she needed to stay for the night" Mark answered, the same rumbling voice from earlier coming from his lips. God, it sounded so nice to listen to at this point in time. Then again, that also might be because I am super horny right now. "She looked cold and wet, and we have a spare room, so I thought 'Why not?' "  
The one who spoke to him nodded his head while humming quickly, his face telling me he wasn't really happy with hearing that. I guess that meant he wasn't nodding his head in approval (If his face was anything to go by), but more in acknowledgment of what Mark had said to him.  
What confused me the most was the fact that in the assault on my nose, I hadn't smelled anything remotely Alpha. Was Mark taking suppressants?  
He certainly seemed to hold the leader role for the men in this motel.  
Nobody else seemed to invite me to stay the night, instead opting for the choice of staring at me longer. As if that would answer their millions of questions about me.  
I tried to tear away my eyes from Mark, lest I give these guys the wrong impression. I tried to look at everyone else, but my heat was making it difficult to distinguish little things about each of them that would help me remember the difference between them.  
"Why are you covering your nose?" Said one of them, this time having a British accent. I could only distinguish that he was squinting at me with a annoyed look while he was standing on the stairs.  
"I have a cold"  
Smooth Ally, real smooth. They're totally gonna believe that. Not.  
Another one beside him gasped, many of his companions turning to him in confusion.  
"What's wrong PJ?" said a different boy beside him, also having a British accent. Or at least, I think it was British.  
The one called PJ had clenched his hand around the guard rail on the stairs, his knuckles seemingly turning white from how hard he was gripping it, looking at me with fear filled eyes. Oh no, did he figure out that-  
"She smells like Alpha!" PJ gasped out.

He did figure it out.  
Most of the men looked toward me, back to PJ, back to me and back to him again. I would have found it a little comical, if it wasn't for the fact they probably wouldn't appreciate me being Alpha.  
"Don't be silly" said a short boy at the foot of the stairs with an Australian accent. "Alpha can't be girls"  
"Yes they can" said another boy beside the Australian one. He had a weird tint of blue that seemed to be his hair. Also British. "Are you sure PJ?"  
"Smell her! You can smell her from a mile away!" said PJ, a newfound urgency in his voice.  
Not all of them made audible noises while sniffing the air, but they all made motions to smell me. You know, wafting their hands from me to their noses and silly things like that.  
Once they did, all of them got horrified looks on their faces.  
"Holy shit! She really is a Alpha" said one of the tall boys on the stairs, holding one of the lamps in his hand.  
"And she's in heat" said the other holding his lamp, trying to hide behind his friends at the foot of the stairs.  
The one with a Scottish accent suddenly grabbed something from out the back of his pants, holding it up to point it at me.  
It was a gun. A quite weak looking one from what I could see.  
Nonetheless, without a shield I really didn't wanna get shot by this guy.  
"Look, I don't care if ya need a place for the night" he said as he looked through the sights on the gun. "I'll be fucking damned if ya 'urt anyone 'ere"  
I remained calm while I looked at him. My experience with gunmen told me that it was better to remain calm with this sort of situation.  
The rest of the boys seemed to take a cautious step back, away from me and their gun wielding friend.  
If anything, my calmness seemed to scare the Scottish boy even further, like he expected me to freak out rather than remain calm.  
"I-I'm not gonna l-let ya 'urt anyb-body 'ere!" he said while his hands shook and he stammered. He was holding the gun correctly, but the way he shook while holding it made me wonder just how many times he had actually pointed a gun at someone.  
His hands caused his gun to shake as well. I looked at how he was holding his gun and the way it was put together.  
"If you're gonna point a gun at someone" I said while staring at his gun. "At least make sure the safety is off"  
His breath hitched in his throat, his face going a shade paler than it was originally. He soon peered down his hands, looking to see if I was correct. I was.  
He hurriedly flicked it off, then re-aimed the gun at me. Only to look shocked that I hadn't moved a single muscle in the time he took to flick the safety off.  
"Why didn't ye launch yourself at me?" he breathed, disbelief evident in his voice.  
"I wasn't trying to hurt you" I said, re-positioning my hand in front of my nose to try and block their scents. "I was trying to prove a point"  
"What point?"  
"That you don't want to threaten someone with something unless you know what you are doing" I said. "It can sometimes get you into more trouble than you already are"  
Luckily, he didn't take that as a insult. Then again, he wasn't likely going to. He looked more scared shitless than anything else.  
While me and the guy had our little incident, we hadn't noticed Mark slowly edging his way over to his friend. Soon Mark placed his hands carefully on his friends shoulder and gun, doing it slowly so his friend wouldn't accidentally shoot me in fright.  
They looked at each other, Mark slowly shaking his head at him.  
"Come on Jack" Mark said slowly. "It's not worth it man"  
Jack took a deep breath in, seemingly believing his friend. He released the gun into Mark's hands, who opted to turn the safety back on and placed it into the back part of his own pants. Despite Mark just saving my life, he looked at me with stern eyes instead of his former gentle ones.

Oh the pros and cons with being an Alpha.  
"If I let you stay the night, will you leave tomorrow morning?"  
"Yes"  
A chorus of complaints sounded from the others, them only quieting down when Mark hurriedly covered his lips with a single finger in a hushing motion.  
When I wondered why, a dozen of feet seemed to walk by the front door of the motel. Everyone, including me seemed to hold their breath as they passed, without noticing anything.  
Jack was the first to whisper-shout the moment he could.  
"But she's in 'er bloody 'eat!" Jack argued with Mark, Mark sighing at his friends unwillingness to give me a chance.  
"You can lock me in the room or something if you want to" I answered, shrugging my shoulders. I probably could have come up with a million better excuses to not be kicked out, but these guys didn't seem like the kind who appreciated dishonesty. "I just really need to not be outside with those maniacs"  
They all seemed to agree with that, either with small nods of the head or quiet agreements. Nobody wanted to be outside in the dark, and the fact I was in my heat might have even driven it more home for the lot of them.  
Mark took a step towards me, snatching my attention away from all of his friends once again. He is really good at doing that. One would almost think he was confident, if it wasn't for the fact that his legs shook while he took that step.  
"Look, this is a place that we made, where we could sleep peacefully without having to worry about being attacked" Mark said, his deep rumbling voice trying to be stern with me. "If you ruin that, I'll never forgive you"  
I nearly laughed at that final comment, but I managed to bring it down to a simple small chuckle.  
Both at the fact that I could do so much worse than ruin it and that the worst he could threaten with, was that he would never forgive me.  
"I can think of so many things you could have said instead of never forgiving me" I said, trying to force away my smile once I saw the disapproval written on his face.  
"Like what?" He asked, looking at me utterly confused.  
"For starters, you could have threatened to kill me" I named the first thing off the top of my head, usually the first one that people would use as a threat.  
Mark looked horrified that I would even mention that, the thought of killing someone either terrifying or horrifying him. Probably both.  
"I couldn't do that" He said, shaking his head at the notion.  
I frowned slightly as I looked at him, trying to figure out if he was telling the truth. Was he really an Alpha? He certainly didn't act at all like one I had ever met.  
"Mark, she could jump us!" whispered PJ, leaning down from his position on the stairs to try and only keep the conversation between Mark and him. If so, he needs to work on his whispering.  
"If she wanted to do that, she would have done so already" Mark said looking at me. "Am I right?"  
He's so trusting. I'd almost say he was naive. So different to someone I knew.  
He was like an angel. Unfortunately, in this world, angels get abused.  
I lowered my hand, being careful not to take a deep breath again and ruin the chance I had been given by Mark.  
"Thank you so much" I said honestly. "You have no idea how much this means to me"  
He smiled gently at me, his eyes half closing. My chest seemed to get fluttery, my words frozen on the tip of the tongue. I was a bit stuck on whether it was the heat making me feel this way or simply how I felt, but it felt kind of familiar to something I had felt in the past for someone else. So, the latter it is.  
Weird, I hadn't felt like this in a long, long time. Not since...  
I mentally shook the thought away of the other person, instead deciding that I needed a good nights rest rather than dwelling on things in the past.  
"Could you show me to the available room?" I asked him, seeing him nod his head.  
He swept his hand towards the stairs, a motion for me to follow him up the stairs to the room he had mentioned before. It didn't take long for him to start the small trek up the stairs, and I followed him.  
Like a flock of scared animals, the rest of the boys scrambled away from the stairs as they watched me with wary eyes.  
I honestly can't say I blame them. Having a Alpha show up who is in heat is not nice.  
Like a surprise. Except this surprise was like finding out your birthday cake was actually an explosive.  
Okay, maybe not that bad.  
As I reached the top of the stairs, Mark pointed to a door right in front of the stairwell.  
"This one" He said, seeing my eyes drawn to it. Once I nodded my head that I knew which one he was talking about, he moved over to the side to allow me to open the door myself.  
The door handle was polished, I already noticed that straight away as I turned the door handle. Surprisingly, the door opened without so much as a squeak or groan from the wood or hinges. These guys really did take care of this place really well.  
"I guess you are gonna lock the door once I am inside?" I asked him, peering inside the room.  
"Yeah, sorry, the guys wouldn't be able to sleep otherwise" said Mark, while looking guilty. "I hope that's okay"  
Goddamn. Can he get any more trusting? Asking the Alpha in heat if it is alright to lock their door?  
I made the mistake of sighing in front of him, meaning I got a whiff of his scent. Some kind of tree.  
I hurriedly ducked inside the room before I got anymore of his scent, managing to keep my rampant emotions sort of in control.  
As I leaned against the door trying to compose myself, I heard the familiar clicking off something locking. Probably the door.  
"I'll get you some water, food and painkillers" came Mark's muffled voice through the door. "You looked like you could use some"  
I laughed nervously, not used to this treatment.  
"If you're not careful, I'll wanna marry you at this rate"  
I had made the comment in jest, more to calm myself than anything else. Nothing really serious, and I had secretly hoped he would be put off and leave me alone rather than continue to put himself in danger around me.  
I heard him laughing on the other side of the door, which I felt a little conflicted about. I mean, sure, him laughing was a bit of a mood lifter. But it wasn't what I had gone for.  
"Here" He muttered, slipping something under the door. I could feel it connect with my soaked boot, making a squishing noise in the process. Something shiny?  
That idiot. He handed me the key to the bloody door.  
"What are you doing?!" I asked incredulously.  
"I feel like I can trust you, plus I have two sets of keys for each door" Mark said. "Besides, how else are you gonna get the food and stuff that I am going to bring you?"  
I sighed heavily, picking up the key and looking at it like it was the bane of my existence at that point in time.  
"Someone is gonna take advantage of you someday" I muttered, more to myself than to him.  
"The fact that you say that makes you a lot more trust worthy"  
 **No. NO. NO! No no no no......**  
I am not trust worthy at all. Not at all. Not after what I had done.  
I tried to stuff the key back under the door, only to have him push it back.  
"I mean it, take it"  
I gave up with a frustrated groan, sliding to the floor. I clutched the key in my hand, looking at the way it twinkled in the dim light.  
He trusted me. Me! Why? It doesn't make any sense to me.  
I looked around the room, seeing the small bath, a dressing shield and a double sized bed. It seemed like they had built each room to have the capability for someone to just camp out in them for days on end. Which I suppose they might even do, in their heat.  
I nearly cried with how happy I was, taking in deep breaths and enjoying the luxury I had been given. Who knows, I probably could have cried just from someone handing me a piece of meat that was edible in the street. I don't even know anymore.  
I stood up, placing the key on the bedside table beside the bed, before quickly chucking off all my clothing (minus undergarments) over the bathtub rim. With any luck, it would dry them while I slept.  
I looked into the bedside table, finding mens clothing. I guess that shouldn't have surprised me, as all the other people in this motel were of the male persuasion. Didn't make it any less annoying.  
I sighed in annoyance as I pulled out a pair of boxers from the drawer on the night stand.  
"That's gonna be uncomfortable as fuck" I grumbled, wearing them over my soggy undergarments. It should help prevent the bed from getting wet, I hoped.  
I heard clinking outside the door, hearing a sturdy but gentle knock on the polished wooden door afterwards.  
"Room service" Mark said, laughing shortly afterwards at his own joke.  
"Thanks babe" I joked back, trying to match his sense of humour.  
We both chuckled for a short while, before I heard what sounded like he was standing up.  
"Well, hope you sleep well"  
"Thanks"  
He seemed to accept that, and I heard him move down the hallway. Not too far down the hallway in fact, the sound of a door opening and closing right beside mine. Super close to mine, in other words.  
Once I was certain that nobody was in the hallway, I unlocked the door and grabbed the tray. It didn't take me long to lock the door again, my ravenous eyes looking over the tray of stuff he had left for me.  
He had given me a full glass of water, a full pack of painkillers, a whole apple, some crackers and what looked like jerky. That sign outside had given me the impression that all of them would have shot me without any warning the moment I stepped foot in here, but Mark actually had gone the extra mile for me.  
I wolfed down the food, feeling the way the food tasted and had been prepared. They had even gone the extra mile in this place to ensure their food tasted amazing. That, or I was really happy to have some proper food rather than the military rations that I had been scrounging on for the last month.  
In short, it was something really plain, but it tasted like heaven to me at that moment.  
I ignored the pain killers, knowing they wouldn't really do much. I made a mental note to return the painkillers to Mark tomorrow, placing the tray onto the floor and crawling underneath the fur covers.  
It felt like I had been enveloped in warmth and comfort.  
I meekly looked at the window, deciding that I didn't care enough about the blinds to do anything.  
I settled into sleep, hoping that tomorrow I wouldn't have swung into the horny part of my heat.


	3. One of a kind

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for some slight implications of non-con in this chapter

I startled myself awake, feeling my body heat up as I opened my eyes. One look to the window didn't really tell me what time it was, as it was still as dark as before.  
Then again, if you are in a cave, what the hell is supposed to be daytime? I never understood bloody Pandora time zones anyway. Was it night or not?!  
I hurriedly scanned the room, looking for a clock. None in sight, just all the furniture I had seen before I went to sleep.  
I sat up in the bed, feeling the fur covers fall off my body slightly, the cold air making my skin break out into goosebumps. I had regretted sitting up immediately, but not because it was cold. My heat had jumped into the horny stage, my loins feeling warm and endlessly sensitive. Why now, of all the times?!  
I grumbled to myself, forcing myself out of the comfy bed. I had to get out of the motel, fast.  
It's dangerous for me to be in a building full of Beta and Omega who want nothing to do with me. Even Mark, who seemed to be an Alpha, didn't really appreciate my presence a hundred percent either.  
I started to grab my stuff from the bathtub, only to realise that it was all completely soaked still.  
I swallowed nervously to myself, noticing that my mouth felt like someone had scratched my tongue with a chili covered sandpaper.  
I started to weigh up my options for what to do. I obviously had to leave long before the rest were awake, otherwise I would probably unconsciously jump them. But I really didn't wanna go out in underwear, or soaking wet clothing while I was in heat.  
I could see if one of them still had suppressants. But I didn't trust myself to walk to their door, knock, and them open their door to me. Yeah, that would end badly.  
What about their medicine cabinet? It could possibly be in their bathroom.  
The only problem was, that I had no clue where their bathroom was.  
Acting sooner rather than later would probably be best. I took the key to the door, unlocking the door.  
I stuck my head half out the door, seeing if I could hear anyone or see anyone.  
The only thing I got was another assault of scents. How the hell?!  
They were all in their rooms, yet I could smell all of them like they were right next to me.  
I hurriedly covered my nose, trying to compose myself. To anyone who would have seen me, I would have looked like I was trying to choke myself.  
I moved away from their rooms, as well as mine, descending the same stairs I had ascended hours before.  
None of the stairs creaked or groaned, the only noises coming from my flustered breathing and the soft padding of my feet on the floor.  
Once I had gotten to the ground floor, I gently uncovered my nose. Despite being quite a distance away, I could still smell them.  
This time, they smelled like they were a door away from me. My stupid sensitive nose.  
I moved towards what looked like a kitchen, being careful to not bump into anything. Some glasses had been left behind on the counter, and I honestly didn't know or didn't care if they had been used before.  
Filling one up to the brim, I chugged it back without much thought behind it. My mouth still felt awful, so I filled the same glass back up once more.  
In my hurry to get more, I accidentally spilled some water over the side of the glass, onto the counter. Butter fingers.  
I ignored it for the most part, knocking back the second glass of water. The worst that could happen was that someone would have to clean it up the next day.  
I heard a noise, a door opening? I froze in place, straining my ears to listen for any further noises.  
I slowly lowered the glass I held back onto the counter, moving slightly to see if I could see any door opening from upstairs.  
The water on the counter top made the glass not stay upright, making it first fall onto its side, then rolling off the counter top.  
It crashed against the floor, sending little bits of glass everywhere around my bare feet.  
"Shit!" I whispered to myself, the reaction coming as instantaneous rather than any real thought behind it.  
I once again froze in place, listening for any sign that the rest of the boys had woken up from either noise. I knew some people back in the day who would easily wake from someone swearing near them, or from a glass smashing.  
It felt like hours that I stood there, though in actuality it was probably just a couple of minutes. Once I had evaluated that no one had woken up, I knelt down to start picking up the broken bits of glass off the floor. I would feel awful if one of them cut their foot open on them.  
Only when I had picked up the pieces I could, did I realise that I had no darn idea where I was planning to put them. I placed them on the nearby counter, deciding that was a better place than the floor. Who knows, maybe the lot of them would even get the hint that a glass broke and not step into the kitchen without thinking.  
Just as I was about to move out of the kitchen and start looking for where their bathroom was, did I hear a large number of footsteps coming down the stairs. I guess my evaluation was off.  
"What the heck was that noise?" asked one of the tall boys as he came closer to the kitchen. Whoever it was was holding a lit gasoline lamp, just like they had earlier. I heard lots of worried murmurs, so I gathered that they had come in an entire group to check out the noise.  
My dumb brain decided that hiding was the best option, me ducking down in the corner behind the kitchen counter.  
That ended up probably being the worst mistake of my life. Well, second worst mistake, compared to what I had done in the past.   
Why didn't I just stand up, and explain that I had dropped the glass?! I mean, sure, some of them would be annoyed at the fact I had snuck around in the dark. And that Mark had given me a spare key to get out of my room. But in contrast to potentially jumping them, surely that would be the lesser evil.  
Mark was the first to enter the dining area which was attached to the kitchen area. I could smell him so well from where I crouched. He smelt like pine, and some kind of alcohol. Whiskey, the smoky flavours digging into my nose and mind.  
He smelled so good.

SO GOOD....

 

Before I had even realised what had happened, I had lunged at him, catching Mark by the shoulders.  
The both of us smacked into the ground with a heavy thud, me being on top of him. I heard something drop from his hand onto the ground, it noisily clattering and rolling around on the wooden floors.  
A chorus of gasps and screams sounded from the rest. I'm even quite certain someone shot at me, the loud banging noise ringing out into the air.  
Regardless, most of the noise around me had mixed into a garbled mess, with my full attention on the man below me.  
Only when I was in close proximity to him did I find out why he didn't smell like Alpha. He smelled like an Omega.  
Despite his strong build, he undeniably wasn't an Alpha. He also seemed to lack the confidence of a Alpha.  
As I hovered above him, he didn't look angry or shocked. If anything, he looked scared out of his mind. He looked like he was about to cry from how scared he was.  
The more I looked at him, the more horrified I was with myself.  
"No... please...."  
As he uttered those words, a single tear slid down the side of his face from his right eye, his hands meekly covering his face afterwards.  
It felt like a slap to the face, which was enough for me to snap out of my hormone filled daze.  
While being momentarily in control, I took the opportunity to jump off Mark and run past the rest of the boys, up the stairs. I think I heard one of them squeal as I did so, the shrill noise further cementing my own horror in my mind.  
I barged into the room I had been given, locking the door as quickly as I possibly could.  
I betrayed him. I betrayed the man who showed me nothing but kindness the moment I walked in the door.  
I wanted to punch myself. No, I probably wanted to do more.  
I heard a whole bunch of screaming from downstairs. Are they still screaming from what I did? As I looked out the window, I saw them all leaving the building. As much as I was probably very frightening to them, I couldn't imagine the reason they had thought up to leave the entire building.  
I shook my head, scrambling to grab my wet clothes. I was going to leave, no matter what.  
I wrapped my wet cloak around my face, hoping it would hide any traces of scents.  
As I unlocked the door and started to descend the stairs, did I smell a ever so familiar scent. Smoke, flames. The smell of something burning.  
I looked inside the dining area, seeing a broken gasoline lamp. Flames erupting all around it, spreading on the polished wooden floors.  
I threw my cloak that was wrapped around my face onto the area, stomping on it as though I was punishing myself for my own stupidity.  
Once I had calmed down, all that remained of my cloak was bits and pieces of rags. Luckily the fire had gone out in the process.  
It seemed like silence would rain supreme, tormenting me with the way my brain was spiraling out of control.

A sound of shuffling alerted me to a presence behind me.  
When I turned around, I noticed a boy with a strange light blue hair colour. I think he was the one who squealed when I ran past him. My hands flew up to cover my nose, out of fear that I might do something I regretted again.  
He seemed scared out of his mind, yet he was taking ever so small steps towards me, holding out his hand to me. It didn't occur to me why he was doing so, until I glanced at what he was holding in his hand.  
A small familiar black pill. A suppressant.  
He was offering a suppressant to me despite what I almost did to his friend.  
I took the suppressant from his hand, him making a small "Eep!" noise when I took it.  
I swallowed it whole, despite my throat being irritated.  
"Wow! You're not at all afraid of the side effects of those, huh?" He asked nervously, chuckling a little strangely as he tried to keep his distance from me.  
"Better than losing control and hurting people"  
He nodded his head, agreeing with me. His blue hair bounced a little as he moved his head, and my eyes started to follow it without meaning to, like some weird sort of hypnotism.  
"I don't know what it's like to have that urge during my heat" He said, a smile forming on his face. "But I think you are handling it pretty okay!"  
I snorted, both to get the smell of smoke out my nose and half-laughing at that comment.  
"Dude, you look absolutely scared shitless" I told him plainly, seeing his eyes look up from the floor into my blue eyes. He had a funny mixture of green and brown. I think that colour was called Hazel?  
"Do I? Haha, well you know the saying" He said as he played with the cuff of his shirt. "The truly brave one is the one who is scared but jumps anyway"  
True that. Unless you are jumping into a ravine. Then you are stupid for jumping.  
"I'm so sorry for what I nearly did to Mark..."  
"Hey, I've seen Alphas in heat before" He admitted to me, not even a shred of hate in the way he said Alpha. "And you are the first one to actually try to stay away from people and stop themselves from hurting people"  
"You must have had shit Alpha around here..."

"Yeah, no kidding"

I could feel the suppressant start to kick in, a strong wave of pain nearly knocking me off my feet. My sense of smell also disappeared, which felt so amazing right now. I could at least finally put my hand down from my nose, but I felt a little bit dizzy along with everything else. Was that the room spinning or was it me?  
I stumbled backwards, hitting my head against the wall before sliding down onto my rear. OW! That was not the best start to a suppressant filled day.  
He looked at me, a mixture of emotions floating around in his eyes. The strongest one was concern.  
"Are you okay, hun?"  
I wasn't about to cry, but I felt like doing so.  
"Why are you all so nice to me?! All I've done is hurt you guys!" I uttered, my voice cracking as I spoke. Talk about a late puberty.  
He knelt beside me, hugging me. His arms were very spindly, which gave the impression that manual labour wasn't really his thing. Despite the foreign arms feeling a little weird... it felt nice...  
"Because everyone deserves to be treated nicely"  
He started to rock me back and forth, like a child almost. In most situations I would have been offended, but it felt like someone really cared about me.  
Didn't someone else do that as well? It didn't matter much to me just then.  
As my consciousness started to fade, I heard people talking.  
"Tyler! Oh my god, are you okay?!"  
"Why is she only wearing that?!"  
The rest ended up into blurred garbage like before, the suppressant causing me to be sleepier than anything else.  
"'m shorry"


	4. Within these four walls

I woke up once more in the same familiar room, the oiled ceiling almost seeming to have gotten shinier since last night. Wait, how did they even oil the ceiling? Did they stand on each others shoulders? For that measure, why did they have wood on the ceiling?  
Ow my head hurts. I looked over to my bedside table, seeing suppressants, a glass of water and a note underneath the items.  
When I grabbed the note to read it, I nearly snorted out loud in laughter from the bright pink paper and the fluorescent yellow used to write on it. That, and there was a lot of little smiley faces all around it. Very manly for a group of males that live together.  
  
"Good morning sleeping beauty! \\(*-*)/"  
"Hope you slept well! You looked like you needed it! There are suppressants for you to take if you think you need them. I'd personally just keep them on your person if you can help it. Feel free to come downstairs to eat or just chat! It would be great to introduce you to all the others so that you don't have to refer to everyone as 'Hey dude'. That, and I don't think even I learned your name yesterday. So yeah, we'll be downstairs when you're ready :D"  
"Your new best friend, Tyler"  
"P.S. Don't worry, Mark forgives you for what happened last night"  
  
I laughed to myself, both for the fact that most of the note was silly drawings and for the fact that they still trusted me enough to let me stay.  
I gladly swallowed a suppressant that he had left for me, seeing as it was best to take two a day.  
I looked over to three piles of clothing that had also been left out for me, them all laid out neatly nearby. One was for a short muscly person, another was medium height which was also for a muscly person, while the last one was for a tall person who was skinny. Despite the choices that had been left for me, they still seemed to all be for men only. The fact that the pants had extra room at the front to account for extra genitals was a bit of a give away.  
I had to take the one for skinny people, as none of the other ones seemed to fit. By "didn't seem to fit" I really meant "my shoulders aren't that wide". As I lifted up the shirt I could fit, I looked over the beautiful pink and purple colours that melded with a little bit of orange. If I had to guess, I would call it a galaxy themed shirt. It looked nice, besides the fact it looked like it belonged to someone much taller than me. I guess one of those really tall guys must own this shirt. I sniffed the shirt, partly to test my smell and to see if it smelled disgusting.  
I couldn't smell anything, what a surprise.  
When I finally was dressed, I headed downstairs, only to hear the chatter of the men all crowded in the dining room. I guess now was a good time to introduce myself properly, unlike before, where I had literally just stumbled into their home and then proceeded to break a glass and burn their floor. God, they probably hated me.  
...Well, no time like the present.  
  
(Jack)  
  
Everyone was crammed around the dining room table, minus Tyler and Connor, who were making food in the kitchen.  
Chris, PJ and Dan stood around the table, while me, Mark, Troye and Phil sat down in the chairs. I honestly don't understand why we never got enough chairs from everyone's rooms to fit everyone around the table, but not wasn't really the time to bring that up with everyone.  
I was looking at my gun, annoyed with the amount of ammo I wasted as well as the things I did wrong with it.  
I hadn't managed to shoot the girl when she first walked into our building. Then, when I tried to shoot her when she was on top of Mark, I missed her and had hit the gasoline lamp that Mark dropped. Very nearly burnt the effing building down.  
Now the bloody thing was jammed. I didn't dare take it apart, cause I had no fucking clue how to put it back together.  
I sighed, which everyone noticed.  
"What's up pal?" Mark said as he placed a hand on my shoulder. He always had been supportive in the past to me, and now wasn't any different, despite the fact I had obviously fucked up.  
"Everything" I said as I ran my hand through my green hair. "From that girl to this stupid gun"  
Chris reached over Phil, picking up the gun. I found myself looking at his strong facial features, his black hair swishing slightly as he stood up quickly. Unless he likes that bowl hair cut he has going on right now, he might want to consider getting Tyler to style his hair.  
"Do you know what's wrong with it?" Chris asked me, moving the gun around in his hands to inspect it.  
"No" I grumbled, playing with my green hair. "If I did, I would be busy fixin' it"  
Chris gave the gun a smack with the palm of his hand after I was done answering his question, which caused everyone standing around him to suddenly move quite a bit away from him. Especially Dan, as the gun was vaguely pointed in his direction. Dan looked at him as if he was stupid, his brown eyes flashing with both fear and disgust.  
"Dude, what if that went off when you did that?!" Dan asked him, not looking very happy with his friend. Dan was quite bristly today anyway, and this wasn't helping him.  
"Safety's on" Chris responded simply, which caused Dan to run an angry hand through his styled dark brown hair. He was going to argue the many reasons about why that logic could be false, but got interrupted by Phil, his other close friend who had his hair styled in a similar way.  
Phil had gotten a grin on his face, which could mean two things. He either has a pun or is remembering something funny.  
"Chris" said Phil, the grin never leaving his face.  "I know it's called a hand gun, but that's not how it works"  
It's a pun.  
"Or are you supporting your right to bare arms?"  
Chris was wearing short sleeves.  
"Phil, now's really not the time" groaned PJ, Phil's other friend with curly locks. The four of them always have been inseparable, but PJ and Dan always had to be the adults of the quartet. What was even funnier, was that PJ and Dan were the younger two of the four of them.  
Phil stopped wearing his grin, looking apologetic for his jokes. Usually puns would be greatly appreciated in our group, except by Mark and Dan, who seemed to have an extreme dislike for them, but everyone was already enough on edge.  
"Sorry" Phil apologised, to which the other three quietly mumbled that it was alright. Chris returned the faulty gun to the table, leaning on Phil's shoulder as he did so.  
"So, what are we doing with the Alpha situation?" asked Troye, a smaller boy who was really good friends with Tyler and Connor, who both were busy in the kitchen. Don't let his small appearance and soft grey eyes fool you, Troye would be the first person to shoot you if you wronged any of us. Heck, the curly haired boy was more likely to shoot someone than I was, which was saying something.  
"Good question"  
We all looked over to the bottom of the stairs, seeing the girl there. My body unconsciously froze, my muscles tensing up as though she had caught us doing something illegal. She hadn't, but that feeling didn't go away.  
"I was wondering about that myself" She admitted to us, playing with a lock of her blonde hair. It got tangled on her finger for a second, and she tugged on it harshly when she noticed that we were all staring.  
We all looked at Mark, wanting his opinion on the matter. He was the closest to what we could call a leader here, so his word carried a lot of weight.  
Not to mention with what happened yesterday, I wouldn't blame him for ordering one of us to shoot her. Well, we didn't actually have a gun, but close enough.  
"Take a seat, we want to discuss that with you" Mark said while motioning towards the open chair at the end of the table. She nodded her head sharply, moving to sit in the aforementioned seat. It creaked a little as she sat down, and she just twirled her hair faster as it did. Was that what she did when she was nervous?  
Once she sat down, her eyes traveled to the gun in the middle of the table.  
"It's dangerous to leave a loaded gun in the middle of the table" She said, making no move to grab it.  
"It doesn't work" said PJ before anyone else. Her eyes traveled to him, which made him start to look very nervous.  
"It's also unwise to tell someone you are unarmed" She said, trying to have no threatening vibes in her voice. Once she noticed she noticed all eyes were still trained on her, her eyes moved down to her feet. She tugged on her hair again, and part of me wondered how she didn't tear chunks out of it with her supposed strength. "On Pandora anyway"  
She didn't look like she was in pain, despite the fact Tyler swore she had taken a suppressant. Those things hurt like a mother fucker.  
"Hey, sweetie!" called Tyler from the kitchen. "Did you take a suppressant this morning?"  
"Yeah, thanks" She thanked him, looking a little confused with the nickname. It wasn't so much that nobody had called her sweetie, but more that she didn't expect him to call her that.  
"How are you not in pain?" asked Dan, glowering at her. Ah, I think I finally found the reason why he was being really bristly today.  
"I get used to the pain after a bit" She mentioned off handedly, trying her best to not tug her hair all out as she looked at him. But despite her comment and her eyes looking at him, she kept glancing back to the gun. "Why doesn't it work?"  
"We aren't sure yet, but I'm getting it fixed soon" I answered quickly, not really wanting to divulge too much information. Telling her that we didn't know didn't sound like such a good idea.  
"Can I take a look?" She asked us, her eyes mostly switching between me and Mark. Probably because Mark was still the de-facto leader, and because I technically owned the gun.  
I looked over to Mark, him returning the same look of "Should we?". It wouldn't really be a good idea to hand a loaded gun to a stranger.  
"Sure" said Phil, his naive trusting attitude showing clearly. Phil, no! "Just don't shoot us with it"  
Duh. I think that part's obvious.  
She picked up the gun, starting to take it apart. I fought every fiber of my being that was telling me to run for the hills, seeing that a lot of my friends seemed to be thinking the same thing. Or, that was the impression they were giving with the way they stood and sat.  
"The trigger return spring is bent" She told us, fiddling with something in the gun. We heard a sharp clicking noise a moment later, and she started to put it back together already. "You can bend it back, but it's only a temporary solution"  
I looked shocked at her. Just how often had she used guns?  
"It probably happened from the wrong type of ammo or the gun is old" She said, absentmindedly talking as she slotted all the parts into each other. "Either way, it's not gonna be usable past two or three shots"  
Once she had fixed it, she held it out to me, the barrel of the gun pointing towards herself.  
"You'll also want to get a semi-automatic so that you don't have to fiddle with the loose barrel on this one" She started to mumble, seemingly more to herself than to me. "But don't get one with a huge recoil, it'll bruise your hands and smack you in the face as well as making you look stupid"  
I took the gun back, noticing the shocked looks from everyone else.  
"Where did ya learn all this?!" I asked, placing the gun on my lap.  
"My brother works for a gun company" she said, a grin started to appear on her face. "He never shuts up about his guns"  
Tyler came bustling out the kitchen, placing a plate in front of each individual person. Omelets, his go to meal if he didn't have anything else.  
"So, I don't think we even have your name" said Tyler taking a seat once everyone had a plate. Even the girl had been given one. "I'm Tyler Oakley, if you didn't know"  
She smiled, looking relieved for the polite person. And probably for the food as well.  
"I'm Allison Forrey" said Allison. "But most people call me Ally"  
The rest of us looked at each other, wondering if we could trust her. I mean, names still probably didn't mean much to anyone out here on Pandora, but that didn't mean we handed it out like free candy.  
"I'm Mark Fischbach" said Mark, smiling at her. I guess it would make sense that he started, despite the slight shake in his hands. "Nice to finally attach a name to the face"  
Ugh, free candy it is. I sighed, before taking my turn.  
"Name's Sean Mcloughlin" I said, not really liking to use my real name. "I'd prefer it if ye called me Jack"  
Her eyes twitched for a moment when she heard me say my nickname. Weird.  
"Hey, I'm Phil Lester" Phil greeted her, his bright blue eyes shining with friendly emotions.  
"Yo, I'm Connor Franta" Connor greeted her, fiddling with his own slightly curly hair. Now that I think about it, a lot of us had curly hair here.  
"Sup, name's Christopher Kendall" said Chris, casually leaning on the table like he wasn't about to run from her earlier. He is really good at faking his emotions, from what I've heard from PJ. "Call me Chris"  
"Hey there, I'm PJ Ligouri" PJ spoke, him speaking a little more softer than his longtime friend.  
"Hello, my name is Troye Sivan" Troye told her, him already starting to pick up his cutlery to eat. Food over meeting a stranger, my man.  
"I'm Dan"  
Out of everyone, Dan was definitely the one who cut his name off the shortest, not even allowing her to hear his full first name. Everyone looked at Dan, wondering why he didn't use his full name.  
"This is Daniel Howell" said Phil, answering for Dan. Dan sighed loudly when he did, which only made Phil smile fondly at his friend.  
"I swear to god Phil" said Dan shaking his head.  
We all laughed a bit, trying to forget the tension for a moment. I'll admit, it didn't last that long.  
"So, what are you actually doing in Hollow point?" asked Connor, his nervous grey eyes looking over her slowly. He huffed loudly a moment later, to push a curly brown lock of hair that had gotten in the way of his sight. "This isn't exactly the friendliest place for people to live"  
She looked at her plate of food, probably weighing up whether or not to make up a lie. She took a deep breath in.  
"I'm running away from my former boss" Ally admitted, putting a small bite of her food into her mouth. Her satisfied hum made Tyler happy, him practically beaming with pride not far from her.  
"Who's that?" Dan asked her, his eyes narrowing in suspicion. She paused in her next bite, some of the food falling off her cutlery and she looked a little bit upset at the splodge of food on her plate.  
"You won't know him" She said quickly, shoving the remains of the food on her cutlery into her mouth before he could ask her another question. It almost looked like she was trying to avoid his questions, which just made him more upset.  
Dan glared at her. It probably didn't help anything that she was wearing the clothes that Mark had taken from his room. Without Dan's permission, might I add.  
"Humor us" He demanded, his speech nearly through gritted teeth. A lot of people that were around him were giving him funny looks, but he ignored them all.  
She looked at him, not in annoyance but definitely wondering why we wanted to know. She resisted the chance to slip another bite of food in her mouth, and seemed to oblige.  
"His name's Tassiter" She mentioned, shrugging her shoulders like it was not such a bother for her, unlike her attitude from earlier.  
We all looked between us, all shrugs or shakes of the head being the communication. True enough, none of us knew him.  
"Where did you work?" asked Troye.  
"A company that makes weapons mostly, sometimes shields"  
Me and Dan seemed to be the only ones that found that suspicious. She didn't mention the name at all, and seemed to give as little information as possible. Did something bad happen to her?  
I let it slip, only because I didn't want to spread possible false rumors.  
"That still doesn't explain why you came to Hollow point" Chris stated plainly, leaning against Phil's seat.  
"I had heard a rumor that people are unable to be tracked here" Ally answered, and this was the first time she sounded one hundred percent honest.  
A couple of us nodded. The rumor definitely floated around, but was it true?  
"What are you planning to do now?" Tyler softly asked. She sighed, being partially interrupted with her bite of food once again, and it once again fell onto her plate. She shrugged her shoulders, looking very lost on how to answer that.  
"I don't know" Ally admitted, both to herself and to us. "I was planning on staying in Hollow point, but I don't want to hurt anyone in the process"  
Some of us still absolutely didn't trust her as far as we could throw her. And that's not very far, as Mark could probably only chuck her about a metre or two if he tried.  
But having a strong Alpha who is quite good with how guns work couldn't hurt.  
Everyone (albeit, some begrudgingly) nodded their approval to Mark.  
"You can stay with us if you want" Mark said while crossing his arms. "But we have to go over some rules first"  
"Not until you eat my food! It's going to get cold at this rate!" Tyler said, pouting.  
Mark sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck, while the majority of us laughed. Ally didn't seem to mind the idea of food first, but stopped herself taking a bite when she seemed to think of something.  
"Wait, so who wears the pants around here?" She asked all of us, which made a number of us snicker or giggle. Tyler just looked proud of himself, while Mark just seemed to go red in the face.  
We couldn't tell if she was serious or joking. Either way, we found it funny.  
"Welcome to the family" I said, placing my hand under my chin.  
"Thanks for having me"


	5. Highway to hell

"So how old are you Ally?"  
"Eighteen"  
"Really? You look older"  
"Yeah, I get that a lot"  
As I walked along side Phil and Dan, Phil seemed quite interested in figuring more about me. Mark had sent the three of us to go collect more wooden planks, to replace the ones that got damaged in the mini fire. And so, he sent me due to my abundant strength to go along with them.  
"Do you have many siblings?"  
"Nah, just my brother"  
"Older or younger?"  
"He's older"  
"How much older?"  
"He's two years older"  
Dan was intent on not looking at me the entire time we walked. I couldn't blame him, but I also found it the slightest bit annoying. I found it quite childish.  
But, I knew arguing with him really wouldn't work out well. So I just spent more energy looking at Phil.  
Phil had pretty dark hair, his fringe swiping towards his right while the rest of his fringe framed around his head. He had a older look about him, but he had the humor of a teenager.  
The more I looked at him, the more he reminded me of my brother. The bad jokes, the kind yet silly personality.  
When he smiled, his eyes seemed to reflect the same. I could also spot some small laugh lines around his eyes, but only when he smiled, like some kind of secret part of him that only showed when he smiled.  
He was about half a head taller than me, causing us to tilt our heads to compensate for the height difference.  
His body wasn't really well built, him being quite skinny. I couldn't guess which class he was (Beta or Omega) due to the fact the suppressants had completely gotten rid of my smell. I knew it would be a moot point to ask him which class he was in, seeing as Omega can't smell themselves or other Omega, and because Beta are extremely hard to smell regardless.  
Dan would also probably find it suspicious that I wanted to know.  
"What classes were your parents?"  
"My parents were both Beta"  
"How is that possible?" asked Dan skeptical. "Two Beta can't make an Alpha"  
"Just like Alpha can't be females?" I asked, raising an eyebrow at him.  
He was taken aback by the sound argument, instead choosing to look away instead of contribute anything more. Nice Ally, first time he speaks to you of his own volition and you snap at him.  
"Look, I know it sounds impossible" I said, letting out a long sigh. I hoped this didn't sound like I was excusing my bad attitude, but just to get all the misunderstandings out of the way. "But I swear, both my parents are Beta"  
"I believe it" Phil said, nodding his head. "My parents were both Alpha and Beta"  
That meant he had to be Omega. You know, if his story was going anywhere that made sense to me.  
"What about your parents Dan?" I asked him, trying to rope him back into the conversation.  
He really didn't like that question. He first shot me a glare, then avoided my gaze like he had before. Except this time, a permanent scowl tarnished his otherwise handsome face.  
Phil leaned towards me, using his hand to tuck my hair behind my ear before whispering gently into it.  
"Dan doesn't like talking about his parents" Phil whispered, looking at Dan the entire time. Dan wasn't really able to see what Phil was doing, his stubborn refusal to look at either of us made that possible. "All I know is that they were both male"  
I bit my lip. The only way for the parents to both be male was if the pairing was a male Omega with another male.  
Omega had the possibility to get pregnant, regardless of the gender. However only males are able to impregnate male Omega.  
You look very confused all of a sudden (Ally, don't break the fourth wall). Well, let me explain how I got to this conclusion. This either happens when the Omega is in their heat, or if an Omega has had their bonding site bitten. A bonding site is a certain location on an Omega (the location differs from Omega to Omega) that would usually only be shared with their bond mate. Other classes had a bonding site as well, but they did not send a person into heat like it would for an Omega.  
In class society, this was seen as the worst kind of insult possible to Omega. Most laws in decent society made this impossible, however some people still broke it.  
Most class society made it that two males or two females had to adopt, rather than make their own kids. But some Alpha found it funny to get a male Omega knocked up. Naturally, most male to female couples could have kids, regardless of class.  
Many male Omega who had a kid against their will, would abandon their child. I suspected this to be the case with Dan.  
He still avoided my gaze like the plague, so I simply dropped the subject. Nice Ally, two reasons why he doesn't want to talk to you.  
"What were your parents talents?" asked Phil, not letting the momentary awkward question hold him back. "You know, cause they both were Beta"  
"My dad's talent was computers, he could do almost anything with them" I said, loving the trip down memory lane. "My mum excelled at geology"  
"How did they meet?"  
"At university"  
"What were they majoring in?"  
"Geology" I answered, laughing at the memories that my father would tell about their university days. "My dad sucked at getting to class on time"  
"What time would he get there?"  
"Four in the afternoon"  
Phil and me laughed, Dan looking a bit more comfortable with our banter. I didn't know why talking about my family made him more comfortable however. Maybe it was because I was the first one to really talk about them, to allow them to look into my life before theirs?  
"What about your brother?" asked Dan quietly. "What class is he?"  
"Beta"  
Phil and Dan gave each other a look. A family with three Beta, and a single Alpha daughter. It was unheard of, to say the least. And with me being a female Alpha... that didn't help.  
"I would constantly get called the adopted one due to my different class" I grumbled, pulling a miffed face from the not so pleasant memories. I wanted to talk about other things, but I really wanted to make them feel like I wasn't hiding things from them. "Seeing as they were all Beta and I was Alpha"  
Phil gave a sympathetic look, Dan looking like he was sorry for asking the question. He looked away again, and I could feel my mental self kicking me again for screwing that up again.  
...Why was I trying so hard to impress Dan?  
"What was your brother's talent?" asked Phil, trying to clear up the awkward atmosphere. Despite it not being the smoothest transition, it still helped. Phil seemed like a really nice guy, the more I spoke to him.  
"He was good at drawing, but he never believed me when I said they looked good" I answered. "He now claims that his talent is gun making, but I don't believe him"  
"Where does he work?"  
"Dahl"  
"Oh dear"  
"Yeah, that was my reaction too"  
The two boys started to slow down, which sent me for a little bit of a loop at first due to neither of them telling me we were doing that. Phil pointed at what looked like a garage on our right, and I looked down his arm to see what he was pointing at clearly.  
"This is where we need to be" He said, leading the way towards the open doors.  
Scooter's garage. I think I remember walking past the place the previous night. Of course it was shut back then, the risk of some annoying Alpha walking in was too great to have their doors open at night. That, or they simply ran only in the morning.  
The three of us walked in, seeing a very greasy man fiddling with a clipboard. He didn't hear us walk in at first, still scratching his head at some problem he had noticed in his work.  
"Scooter" Dan spoke up, his voice making Scooter turn his head to look at us. Scooter took a moment to register who we were, before a big grin grew on his face.  
"Well hello boys, what can I do for ya?" Scooter greeted them, talking to them like old friends.  
"Do you have any more spare wood that you don't need?" asked Dan, placing his hands on his hips. "We have run into a little bit of a problem with some of the planks in the dining room"  
"Aw shucks boys, you took the last shipment" said Scooter, flinging his clipboard onto a nearby desk. "I promised Janey that she would get this one"  
"Oh, uh, yeah" said Phil, suddenly getting awkward. "How is she at the moment?"  
"Phil, wood is more important right now" said Dan while crossing his arms.  
Scooter then noticed me, almost as though he had not seen me when I entered the garage. His eyes widened, while his jaw dropped. I don't think I'm interesting enough to warrant that reaction.  
I started to play with my hair, not sure what else I was supposed to do.  
"Scooter, hey!" said Dan as he started to snap his fingers in front of Scooter's face. He looked really irritated, his handsome face once again marred by a scowl. "SCOOTER!"  
"Hu-What?"  
"Pay attention!"  
"Sorry, sorry" said Scooter as he composed himself. "What were we talking 'bout again?"  
Dan rolled his eyes, rubbing his temples like he was talking to a really fussy child. He took a deep breath in, and tried again.  
"Wood!" Dan cried, unable to hide his frustration.  
"Wood? Morning wood?" Scooter said, completely forgetting what they had talked about.  
Phil laughed while slapping his thigh, while Dan sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. Despite my best efforts to not laugh, a snort did leave my mouth. This only made Phil laugh louder, while Dan looked at me in disapproval. Not the kind that made the scowls from earlier, but the kind that seemed to say that he expected better.  
"Geez, what's goin on 'ere?"  
I turned around to see a short haired blonde lady. She had a couple of scars on her face as well as arms, long jagged red marks marring what would have been milky white skin. I wasn't sure what to think of the marks, beyond being surprised that someone could endure that much damage and still walk around without a care in the world.  
Her eyes fell on me, a smirk growing on her face.  
"So, who's girl are you?" said the lady. "Cause if I was single, I'd go for ya"  
I laughed, the remark being enough to tell me a bunch about this woman. A girl who isn't afraid to speak her mind out loud, despite how it might come across. I like her already.  
"I'm not anyone's girl" I answered, fiddling with my hair as I spoke. "I don't think people like me enough"  
"Oh, hun" she said shaking her head gently. "That's not the impression I'm gettin from Dan and Phil"  
Dan looked at her confused, while Phil looked almost mortified to see the woman. I guess this woman was Janey?  
"H-Hey Janey" Phil mumbled, trying to keep his voice stable. "How's things?"  
"Things are great" Janey answered, starting to grab her toolbox from the floor in the middle of the garage. Knew it. "I'm glad you found someone right for ya after you an me"  
"Oh, uh, no, she's..." began Phil. Dan eyed Phil warily, one of his eyebrows raising slowly in a questioning way.  
"Are you always this awkward around your exes?" asked Dan. Ah, so that's why he was acting so awkward around her. I guess I should have figured that out from the remark she had made.  
"No, just around Janey" Phil admitted, pulling a nervous face while fiddling with his own hair. Hey, someone who also played with their hair when they were nervous! Nice.  
Janey laughed, before giving Phil a playful smack on the shoulder. He recoiled heavily from it, the little contact making him even more skittish. Despite the fact it was obvious, she didn't seem to really care much about he reacted. I'm betting that she was the one who broke up with him.  
"So, what do ya guys need?" Janey asked us, walking by our trio to stand next to Scooter.  
"We need wood to replace some damaged boards in the motel" Dan said, starting to look annoyed. I guess he was a kind of person who didn't like to deviate from their original purpose.  
Janey clicked her tongue, looking at Scooter. Scooter shrugged his shoulders at her, which seemed to give her an answer enough that he didn't really have any for us.  
"Unless Scoot 'ere has some, you're outta luck"  
Well, we darn well know what his answer was. Dan at least knew what the answer was from Scooter, so he sighed.  
"Alright, I guess that means we're done here" Dan finished off the conversation, him deciding for the rest of us that we weren't going to stick around any longer. Which was good, as Phil didn't really look like he wanted to speak at that point. We all gave quick goodbyes and good lucks to the two mechanics before heading off.  
"Great, now what do we do?" I asked, walking out of the shop, scuffing the ground with my foot. I waited for them to lead the way, trailing in slightly behind them.  
"We could head over to the marketplace" Phil suggested, pointing in some vague direction on the other side of the town.  
"That's only open during the night cycle" Dan retorted, quickly shooting down the solution. Despite him being the main "leader" of our little group, he didn't seem to have any ideas of his own on where else we were supposed to go.  
We ended up simply walking in the general direction of the motel, none of us really speaking.  
I didn't know what to speak about, Dan didn't seem in the mood for talking and Phil still seemed to be in shock from talking to Janey.  
For some reason, my gaze rested on Dan, checking him out the way I had done Phil earlier.  
Unlike Phil, Dan looked quite youthful. If he had told me he was my age, I would probably have believed him. Smooth dark brown hair, a shade lighter than Phil's, seemed to also be styled like his friend. The only real difference was the directions that they swiped, with Dan's swiping towards his left instead of right.  
I couldn't compare their smiles, cause in the time I knew Dan, he hadn't smiled a single time at me. I guess I couldn't blame him, we had only known each other for a couple of days after all.  
While Phil had a almost childlike attitude about a lot of things, Dan seemed more serious and down to earth. Which also made sense, considering the grave problems with Pandora that happened every day.  
But despite all that, I had to admit that the combination of these two guys seemed to work quite well.  
"Why are you looking at me like that?" Dan asked me, looking very grossed out with my constant gaze. Despite him looking grossed out, it looked... a little exaggerated?  
Oops. He caught me staring. Make that the third thing I stuffed up in one and a half days. That's got to be a new record for me, even considering the day when I literally shot myself in the foot.  
"Are these clothes that I'm wearing yours?" I asked him, holding out the galaxy themed shirt I was wearing.  
Smooth. He's really gonna believe that.  
"...Yeah, they are" Dan said softly, sounding like he somewhat bought my excuse. Wait, he actually accepted that as a proper reason?!  
"Do you need them back anytime soon?" I continued along my questions, hopefully to make it more believable. That, and I was legitimately curious about whether or not he needed this back.  
"Not right now, but I'd like it back sometime" Dan said, once again directing his gaze anywhere else other than my face. I guess that was normal for him.  
"Of course" I said, dropping the subject.  
As we walked by the alleyway that led to that weird bar, the three of us noticed some familiar faces. We could spy both Jack and Mark, who were entering the bar.  
"Isn't that really bloody dangerous with the Alpha having their heat this week?" I asked, looking to both men.  
"Yeah, we only went to Scooter's cause it was somewhere safe and cause we had you with us" said Phil, his eyes locked onto the door of the bar.  
Wait, does that mean they trust me enough to protect them? Weird, I had destroyed so much of their stuff that I thought they had sent Dan and Phil with me simply because nobody else wanted to. Guess I was wrong about that.  
"What the hell are those two doing?! They're gonna get themselves killed, or worse!" Dan said, looking like he was gonna faint. I guess his bark is worse than his bite.  
"Well, we should go help them" I answered, immediately taking a couple of steps down the alleyway. I admit, I got curious when I couldn't hear their footsteps behind me, and I turned around to see that Dan and Phil hadn't moved an inch.  
"Oh hell no! The last time we went there, we nearly got shot!" Dan said while biting his lip nervously, with Phil nodding his head to back up his friend's statement.  
"Not to mention the owner's an Alpha" said Phil peering around me, his eyes still locked on the front door.  
I made up my mind pretty easily what I was going to do, sighing a little before swiveling on my feet back towards the bar.  
"Go back to the motel, I'll go help them alone" I told them both, making a shooing motion to get them to leave. "I'll be back before you know it"  
Dan looked like he was about to protest, but Phil gave him a small push in the direction of the motel. The last I could see and hear of Dan, he was yelling something angrily at Phil as his friend kept pushing him.  
"Please bring them back safe" Phil said with pleading eyes.  
"Will do" I promised, smiling at him once last time before the both of them scampered down the walkway out of my sight.  
Well, let's hope the owner of this bar isn't trigger happy.


	6. Partners in crime

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A minor mention of a person being drunk in case anyone doesn't like that, and some hints towards abuse towards another character in there as well, so be on the lookout for that if it makes you uncomfortable.  
> Other than that, some violence, but that's a little more common place in this story anyway.  
> But hey, I hope you enjoy :D

As I walked down the sick filled alleyway, I looked up the the slightly familiar sign that I had seen the previous night.  
The Purple Skag. It's almost like the owner wanted to scare away people. Who likes the idea of Skags when they're trying to drink, or in some cases, trying to pick up a date?  
From what Dan and Phil had said before they ran home, I hoped to god and back that the Alpha took suppressants or something.  
Otherwise the boys are in big trouble.  
I noticed graffiti on the nearby wall, most of it being unintelligible drivel made by psychos or idiots. A couple seemed to literally be male genitals. Of course.  
Only a single thing drew my attention, a poster being placed somewhere almost hidden away.  
It was a wanted poster, showing Mark's face on it. It didn't say what he had done or what the reward was. Just that he had to be taken alive and brought to a certain location.  
The photo was also not really a nice one. It showed Mark, his face bruised and bloody, tears coming out of his eyes.  
In fact, he looked like he had been knocked unconscious, a random hand gripping his hair to keep him upright. The more I looked at it, the more annoyed I became. I couldn't really explain why, but seeing the bad treatment of a person that has treated you nicely seems to rub me the wrong way.  
I grabbed it off the wall, ripping it to shreds in my hands. Once I was satisfied it was destroyed enough, I kept walking towards the bar.  
As I came to the front door, a big muscle bound man stood in my way. He looked like the stereotypical idiot Alpha.  
He had nuts and bolts in a lot of places on his shoulders, them glistening in the dim light from the bar. I couldn't tell what the majority of them were for, but he didn't seem to care that they moved when he stretched his shoulders.  
He scowled at me when I approached him further.  
"I need to get inside" I calmly said, placing a hand on my hip.  
"The boss is busy" He responded with the same ease I had said my sentence.  
"I'm with the people who just entered the place"  
"No you ain't" he said, crossing his huge arms across his chest. "I know them boys, and you haven't been round them"  
"I'm new"  
"Prove it"  
I opened my mouth to protest or say something obscene, but a noise from inside the bar distracted the both of us. It sounded like a piece of glass smashing. I didn't see a window broken, which could be both a good and a bad sign.  
"Move fat ass" I growled, moving myself threateningly towards him.  
He simply laughed, probably thinking I couldn't touch him or some stupid logic like that.  
"Look at yourself girl" he said smugly. "A small thing like you couldn't do shit against me"  
Now it was my turn to laugh. I had to admit, I really liked it when I was able to put idiots in their place.  
"That's adorable" I smirked. "You think that's how this is gonna work"  
I placed a hand on his shoulder, gripping it tightly. He suddenly didn't seem so sure about my weakness, looking at my fingers as I crushed a number of nuts and bolts together in my fingers.  
"Wha-  
I used only my right arm to lightly fling him out of my way, him going skidding down the road about five metres.   
"Stay out of my way, moron" I said, turning the door knob of the front door.  
When I opened the door, I saw some guy with a beer bottle in his hand, angrily pointing at Mark and Jack across the room. The both of them had their arms raised to try and calm him down, but he didn't seem to be listening.  
"Man, fuck you two! That gun's perfectly f-" he knocked over a glass by accident before continuing his drunk rant. "Perfectly fine!"  
The man had blonde hair which was styled into a upward sort of mohawk. He had a small goatee, it also being the same shade of blonde.  
On his nose, was a light green nose ring, which matched the ones in his right ear.  
He also seemed heavily drunk, with him stumbling all over the place as well as knocking over things accidentally.  
Mark and Jack took a step away from the drunk man, staying close to one another. Mark turned his head, seeing me.  
I nodded my head in a greeting towards Mark, before moving to stand beside them.  
"Who the-" he smacked his leg into a chair before returning to his sentence. "Who the fuck are you?"  
"Well, aren't I glad you're a silly drunk" I said, smirking to myself. Ah, my one weakness, making snide comments and jokes during serious times, you come to the fore once again.  
Mark and Jack were waving their hands frantically in a way to tell me to not aggravate him. Luckily, the drunk man didn't notice anything they did.  
"Bitch, I'll mop the floor with you!" he said, throwing his beer bottle over my shoulder. It crashed against the wall, spilling the foul smelling brown liquid into the old and chipped paint.  
"Ah, a silly drunk AND and a angry drunk" I said snickering, both loving and hating my attitude right now. "That's a bad combination dude"  
"Stop!" Mark whisper shouted. "You're making things worse!"  
I waved him off, focusing my attention on the drunk guy. I knew that some people worked well when you put them in their place, and this guy needed to learn to back the hell off when he's drunk.  
Surprisingly, the drunk guy calmed down, coming close to me to take a closer look. He audibly sniffed, and I tried my best not to pull a face at his foul smelling breath.  
"You don't smell like anything" He slurred in his drunken drawl. "But you can't be a Beta"  
"Why not?"  
"Cause no Beta acts like you do" He told me, pointing at my chest while doing so. He's lucky he wasn't actually touching my chest, otherwise I would not be a happy camper. "Besides, I can smell Beta pretty good when I'm in my heat"  
I noticed Jack pull a disgusted face to my right, his entire demeanor changing from fright to a mild pissed version. That probably meant that he's a Beta.  
The guy I flung down the road came barging into the room, rubbing his shoulder in pain. I noticed a couple of bolts being missing in his shoulder, and I had to bite my tongue to not make a remark about it.  
"I'm sorry August sir!" He said hurriedly, not even caring that he essentially told me his boss' name. "I didn't think she'd be that strong! I have no idea why that is!"  
August didn't look away from me. He smirked, which actually looked more like he froze mid wink. One eye half shut with a stupid grin on his face.  
"That's cause she's a Alpha" August purred, which reminded me of the fact that our branch of humanity was weird. We could growl, we could snarl and we could purr just like an animal, despite being one hundred percent human. We didn't howl at the moon, luckily enough. "You should be honored Tector, there aren't that many of them"  
I placed my hands on my hips, looking at him with my most threatening face. It was kinda hard to do so, seeing as he was half a head taller than me.  
August waved off Tector, which only really worked when he gave his employee a half assed glare. Tector seemed to reluctantly oblige, shutting the door to the bar behind him.  
August leaned against a table, almost falling over it. I couldn't tell when he was going to do something cool or do something stupid at this rate.  
"So, what are you doing here?"  
"I'm making sure you don't hurt my boys"  
Mark and Jack both looked a bit confused, but seemed to let it slide. August laughed, which sounded more like he was snorting.  
"Your boys eh?" August slurred, before turning to Mark and Jack. "Is she with you schmucks?"  
"Yes" Mark said, placing a hand on my shoulder.  
I could feel his hand shaking on my shoulder, the vibrations slightly moving the shirt I had borrowed from Dan. I hoped he wasn't shaking because he was touching me. Ah, let's face it, he probably was.  
August looked between the three of us, taking a moment to check if we were serious. Once he decided we were (Or he just didn't care) he shrugged his shoulders unceremoniously.  
"Whatever floats your boat hun" August mumbled before focusing on the guys. "What did you guys want again?"  
"A new gun"  
"Why? It works doesn't it?"  
August seemed to get back his annoyed attitude, his nostrils flaring. Jack sighed lightly, not loud enough for August to hear him.  
"The return spring is not good, not to mention the barrel is loose" I answered, pulling has attention back to me.  
"Who cares? If it shoots, it shoots" August said while waving his hand weirdly. "If it breaks, you get a new one"  
"That's exactly why we are here" Mark answered, staying close to me. "We want to get it replaced"  
"Yeah, but getting it replaced is different from buying a new one, dude"  
August rested his eyes one me, his failed smirk returning. I could hear Jack pretend to vomit behind me, and August didn't seem to notice it. Just like always.  
"I'll give you one if she kisses me"  
"No" I told him, shaking my head firmly.  
He clicked his tongue, but didn't press the subject further. He's not that bad looking, but I don't wanna kiss a guy when he's in heat and drunk.  
He scanned the rest of the bar, looking for something. When he found it, he stumbled his way over to the dart board, picking a dart off it.  
To my surprise, he ties it to a lamp, letting it dangle from it.  
"If you're so good at guns as you seem to spout" August said, sitting down (And nearly missing the darn thing) on a nearby stool. "Surely you can hit the skinny part of the dart"  
I nodded my head, accepting his mock challenge. I held my hand out to Jack, awaiting the gun. To my surprise, he handed the gun over to me pretty willingly despite his earlier reluctance today.  
I curled my fingers around the metal, relishing the good old feeling of a gun in my hands. It had been weeks at least. A quick check to the sights, the barrel and the firing pin, I clicked back the firing pin and I felt ready to take on the world. Eh, a dart is a good start.  
I held it out, turning the safety off and pulling the trigger swiftly. I heard the sound of the gun firing, bullet against metal, then hearing the thudding noise of the bullet lodging itself into the wooden wall of the bar.  
This piece of shit is really weak. Jesus, I've seen guns made of plastic that had a sturdier recoil. This just felt like a slap to my palm.  
I flicked the safety back on, taking in the shocked looks of Mark and Jack, along with the nod of approval from August.  
I had hit the dart perfectly, the end of the dart missing.  
"Nice" August said, sounding genuinely impressed. "Even with a shit gun like that, you did good"  
Goddammit so he did know it was shit. I opened the gun, taking the spent bullet out. I then removed the rest of the viable bullets, slipping them into my pocket.  
I handed the empty gun to August, the barrel pointing to the floor.  
"Now then, you did promise"  
"Yeah, I did, didn't I?"  
August went behind the counter, looking for a gun. While he did, I flashed a thumbs up towards Mark and Jack.  
Mark simply looked stupefied at me, while Jack raised a thumbs up in return to mine, a silly grin on his face. It was the first smile Jack had given me.  
August returned, holding a dark blue pistol out towards me. Well, I say pistol, but with the massive chamber and everything it might as well have been a shotgun. When I took it, I felt the heavy weight that I was used to with guns.  
I looked at all the components, seeing it was a single shot pistol. It had everything working on it, from what I could tell at a quick glance. No way I letting this guy rip these guys off twice.  
It had a extra button on it near the sight, which peaked my interest. When I pressed it, the gun changed colour to a green colour.  
Another experimental push, and the gun turned red.  
"Wait" I said shocked, tilting the gun to see if it was just a trick of the light. "Is this a gun that can change elements?!"  
"Hell yeah it is" August said, loving my enthusiasm for the gun. "Only problem is, you have to reload it every fucking time you fire the damn thing"  
I could see how that might be annoying. But the elemental part makes up for it. I was great at reloading quickly, so that wasn't a problem for me.  
I gave August a smile, the first genuine one he had probably seen from me.  
"Thanks man"  
"Hey, no problem" said August, grinning like he met an old friend. "Anything for someone who loves guns"  
Mark took this as our cue to leave, taking me and Jack by the wrist. August didn't seem to care, now more interested in some other kind of funny looking drink he stored in his bar.  
Once we were out of the Purple Skag and far enough away from Tector, did Jack become excited.  
" 'oly shit that was awesome!" Jack cried out, jumping up and down like some giddy child.  
I laughed, while Mark just grinned at him.  
"I got to admit, I thought that when you showed up that everything was going to go pear shaped" said Mark, grinning at me. "But you can really handle yourself"  
"Yeah! And did ye see 'er shooting?! 'oly crap you 'ave to teach me sometime!" Jack said, about as happy as a kid in a candy shop.  
"I thought I wasn't trust worthy?" I joked, but I kind of regretted it when I saw his smile falter. He suddenly seemed really interested in playing with his fingers.  
"Yeah, sorry" Jack said, avoiding my gaze. "There aren't many Alpha that we could trust in the past, so we-I kinda jumped to conclusions"  
"Hey, don't worry about it" I said while handing him the elemental pistol. "I completely understand, most Alpha aren't very nice people"  
Jack raised his eyes back to me, hesitantly taking the gun.  
"Aren't ya gonna take this?" Jack asked, referring to the gun still in my hands.  
"Why?"  
"You're a way better shot than me"  
"I can throw people over buildings" I said showing off my biceps as a joke. While I was meaning it as a joke, I actually do think I could throw people over buildings if I focused. "I'll be fine"  
"You two should share it" said Mark, trying to make a sort of compromise. That, or he just wanted someone to take it without trying to talk about it for hours. (Speaking of biceps XD)  
We both nodded, agreeing with that statement. Jack placed it in the back of his pants, like usual.  
"Why aren't Phil and Dan with you?" asked Mark, him suddenly realising that the two tall boys were not following me around.  
"I sent them home when I came to save your arses"  
Jack giggled while Mark chuckled at my remark, their immature minds finding the word 'arses' funny for some reason. They both then tried to stop themselves, trying to look mature. I simply raised an eyebrow while smirking, which almost set them off again.  
I gently patted them both on the shoulder, making sure not to use too much force.  
"Come on, let's go home"

 


	7. Uptown Funk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Violence, along with some minor unwanted buttgrabbing (Lord help me that sounds wrong)

"Come on slow pokes!"  
"Isn't it dangerous to be out at this time?"  
"We'll be quick!"  
I sighed, jogging to keep up with my two boisterous friends. I swear, the both of them really could be a handful, despite me being the youngest out of us three.  
Tyler insisted that we go to the night market, saying that they wanted to find some proper clothes for our new housemate. Connor and me came along, worried that he would get himself hurt, due to the Alpha heat week being in full swing.  
I started fishing in my pocket for my wallet, me being the only one in the group that had money remaining from our construction work earlier this month.  
"I don't understand"  
"Don't understand what?" Connor asked me, and I found it really difficult to look at him right then and there.  
"Why Mark still trusts her" I answered, looking up at the cave roof. "I mean, he's had the worst experience with Alpha"  
Tyler lightly slapped my face, not enough to even hurt. I still didn't understand why he did that, and my face seemed to be enough for him to explain himself.  
"Remember Troye" Tyler said, a serious tone coming to his voice. "A person is a person, regardless of their class"  
Connor and me looked at each other, not sure how to take the comment. Tyler was right... in a way, but that still didn't make our unease go away.  
"Yeah, but Alpha are way more known for causing trouble" Connor said, trying to make Tyler see the other side of the argument. "They also are the ones who can get away with it the most, because they are strong and because Alpha all band together"  
"Not all Alpha band together" Tyler responded, speaking matter of factly in return to Connor's tone. "And just because they are more known for causing trouble, doesn't mean all Alpha are the-wait, hold up"  
The three of us stopped for a moment, letting a group of what seemed to be drunk bandits walk out of an alleyway in front of us.  
I looked hesitantly at Connor. His talent was being able to run fast and for longer distances than most people, but it wouldn't work well if he had to run with both me and Tyler. He returned my look, us nervously taking a step back.  
He would either have to carry us both, slowing himself down dramatically. Or he could run on his own back to the motel, which would leave me and Tyler vulnerable.  
Luckily for the three of us, the bunch of drunk bandits turned to go down the opposite way from us.  
We all sighed in relief.  
"I still think we should head back" Connor said nervously, his lip quivering.  
"Would you rather that we wait for it to be pitch black and for us to come back with Ally?" Tyler asked, but we both were not sure if he was being serious or sarcastic.  
Connor shook his head along with me. We didn't trust Ally enough to take that chance yet.  
"Let's just hurry and get back" I sighed, and the two of them agreed with me, all three of us walking just a little bit faster than we were doing before.  
"Back to the previous topic" Tyler said, not giving up. "Judging someone for being a Alpha is exactly the same as someone judging Troye because he's Omega"  
Aaaand there's Tyler's talent. Being able to persuade people, sometimes even if they were the most stubborn of people. He can persuade so many people into doing things they didn't even begin to think about. I once saw him persuade some bandit that it was a bad idea to attack him, giving us enough time to run away from him.  
I sometimes was amazed, other times terrified of what he might have done if he was evil.  
What about me, you ask? I didn't have a natural talent, what with me being an Omega after all.  
I was, however, gifted with great vocal chords. I also had been tested and proven to be able to remember sounds well, knowing them at a single tone. Literally, the worst thing to have in a life or death situation.  
"So, what do you think she'll want to wear?" Tyler asked. "A skirt with leggings?"  
"It's too cold in Hollow point for that" I said placing my hands behind my head. "What was she wearing when she came into our motel again?"  
"She was wearing pants, a shirt and a cloak if I remember correctly" answered Connor, scratching his chin. "Ah, here we are"  
Like he said, the night market loomed ahead of us. The lights hadn't been turned on, nor had all of the stalls been set up.  
This was a good sign to us, meaning the bustling busy part hadn't begun. We could quickly check the clothing stalls and leave long before anything happened.  
"Ah! There's one!" Tyler mentioned, pointing to a store that was starting to place coat hangers all over his shop with clothing on them.  
All the clothing that hung there was either red, black, a dark blue or brown. The typical colours of Hollow point.  
None of the clothing looked particularly girly, most of it being the stock clothing that the bandits in the neighbourhood wore.  
"I don't think she'd like anything here" I admitted, scanning my eyes over all the items of clothing.  
"Yeah, I think so too" Connor agreed, sighing to himself. "I guess this was a waste of time"  
"Now hold on, let's not be so hasty" Tyler said, leaning forward to inspect the clothing items. "Maybe she would like a mask, after all we don't what she- AAH!"  
I looked over to Tyler to see what he had screeched about. I mean, Tyler did screech a lot, but he usually had a good reason for it. Most of the time. Some random guy decided to grope him, grabbing his right butt cheek.  
"Dude! Buy me dinner first!" Tyler said offended, swerving around to glare at the man. "Don't you have... any..."  
Tyler paused mid sentence as many other bandits in the area started to all appear from nowhere, all of them making strange growling noises or laughing. When I looked closer at many of them, I noticed they looked like the bandits we had avoided earlier along the road.  
Shit. I should have known they were up to no good.  
"You smell sweet..." the man who groped Tyler whispered, leaning his face closer to Tyler. "I didn't know Beta smelled this good..."  
Tyler took a step back, banging into the clothing stall. He raised his arms in a vain attempt to tell the guy to back off.  
I looked over to see if the guy who owned the stall was still there, but he had long run away once conflict had started to arise.  
"N-Now now, let's not g-get hasty" Tyler said, his voice wavering and losing its persuasive powers. "I'm s-sure there's some nice lady that might fancy a g-guy like you"  
One thing that I knew better than anything, was that Tyler's persuasive talent would only come into effect when he was calm and spoke clearly.  
I looked over to Connor, seeing him frozen in place, a frightened look on his face. Connor's talent would only get himself out of trouble, but likely not get everyone out of trouble.  
Guess that only leaves me. With my good singing and being able to remember distinct sounds.  
This isn't good.  
"OMEGA...."  
I instinctively flinched after hearing the unfamiliar voice in my ear, swinging around to notice a whole bunch of bandits had snuck up behind me and Connor as well.  
I swung my leg at the nearest bandits leg, hoping to knock some sense into both my friends and the bandits.  
The only thing that ended up happening was that my leg smacked into his leg, causing extreme pain for me while he didn't seem to flinch.  
Why do Omega have to be so weak?!  
"AAH!"  
Tyler let out a frantic scream, a bandit picking him up by the waist and trying to sling him over his shoulder.  
"No! No! NO! NO! SOMEONE HELP ME!"

  
Someone flew down the same alleyway which we had come from, kicking the bandit in the face. The bandit flew over a couple of stands, crashing into one that contained a whole bunch of cabbages. (MY CABBAGES!!)  
Tyler landed somewhat inelegantly on the ground, while the person who had kicked the bandit stood up from the crouching position that had been forced to land in. They flung their blonde hair over their shoulder, placing their hand on their hip mockingly.  
"So much for a bandit" they chuckled to themselves. "A real bandit would have drawn their weapon and used it instead of grabbing some random dude"  
The familiar galaxy themed clothing, the enormous strength and their long, almost wavy blond hair made it obvious to who it could be.  
"Ally?!" I uttered, shocked. Why would she come help us?!  
She smirked, her brown eyes having a newfound mischievous streak in them despite the situation. I guess that's one of the reasons people say that Alpha love to fight.  
"You expecting someone else to drag your butts out of the fire?" she said, winking at me.  
Tyler scrambled up to his feet, moving closer to her for some kind of support. Many of the bandits still seemed to be in shock from their buddy getting launched.  
"Geez, how drunk do these idiots have to be?" she joked. "And here I thought I was going to have a challenge"  
One of the bandits seemed to take this as a challenge, pulling a knife out of his boot and charging at Tyler with it.  
"Move princess, unless you plan to have a new scar" Ally said, placing her right arm around his waist.  
With the grace and speed of a ballerina, she picked Tyler up, placing him in his new precarious position onto her right shoulder, him shrieking as she did so. With her available left arm, she grabbed the bandits arm, twisting it a full 180 degrees.  
"Hey dude, can you now touch your elbow with that hand?" she said while snorting to herself.  
"OWW!"  
"I'm gonna assume that means no"  
All the bandits now focused their attention on her, losing interest in the rest of us caught in the vicinity. She used both her hands to fling Tyler our way.  
Unfortunately, Connor and me sucked at catching. Tyler ended up smacking into the both of us, knocking the three of us into a messy pile of limbs on the floor.  
While we tried to sort out how to get untangled from each other, we heard the rowdy noises of fighting from where we knew Ally to be. Occasionally we would have to wriggle a little bit to avoid getting squashed underneath a bandit that got flung our way.  
A whole bunch of noises seemed to be blended into each other.  
Wood breaking. Bones snapping. The bandits yelling obscenities. Punches. I even think we heard a noise that sounded like someone was slapping someone. Whether it was Ally slapping someone else or that she was getting slapped, we didn't know. In fact, we didn't know if any were directed toward her or not.  
Once the noise died down, did we decide to snap out of our shock to the situation.  
Tyler used a nearby lamp pole to drag himself up off us, looking over to the carnage.  
"Oh my god..."  
When me and Connor finally managed to get up, did we see what Tyler was talking about.  
Ally stood in the same spot she was standing in originally, not even seeming winded from the fight.  
None of the bandits seemed to have even landed a scratch on her, them all strewn about in random places around her.  
She stretched her shoulders, looking around herself at the fallen bandits.  
How was she able to do that while on suppressants? Most of us back at the motel couldn't even stand being on that stuff for a couple of minutes.  
"Wow" she sighed to herself. "You all are really pathetic"  
Pathetic?! They could have taken us down no problem!!  
How the hell did she get the idea this was easy?!  
"No guns, you're all drunk, two guys with knives" she shook her head as she spoke. "And you pick on people who didn't do anything to you! Honestly"  
Wait, so they weren't pathetic because they were weak. They were pathetic in her eyes due to them being people who picked on the weak?  
Tyler lightly jabbed the both of us in the ribs.  
"What did I tell you? She's a good person"  
That, or she's really good at lying.  
And anyway, wasn't she supposed to be with Dan and Phil?  
"Where's Dan and Phil?" I asked, drawing her attention to me.  
"They got sent home by me when Jack and Mark needed my help at the Purple Skag"  
Wait, what?!  
"Then they all realised that you three were missing at home, so they asked if I could look for you" she answered, moving closer to us. "And boy am I glad they did! If I hadn't showed up just now..."  
She trailed off, not finishing her sentence. Our imaginations were enough to fill in the blanks.  
Bad things would have happened.  
"Oh my god! You're bleeding!" Connor gasped, pointing at her left hand.  
Ally raised her left palm to her face, inspecting her left hand almost as though she hadn't felt the stab of pain from earlier. Everyone, including us, could see the dark red drops slowly trickling down her hand, before dropping to the wooden floor underneath us.  
"Huh, so it is"  
"Why are you so calm about your hand bleeding?!" Connor asked, grabbing out a bandage he had stored in his pocket.  
"Eh" She said while shrugging her shoulders. "To be honest, I've had worse"  
She stayed still, letting Connor bandage her hand.  
What was she doing before in life that makes a deep cut on the palm of her hand to seem like a cakewalk?  
I felt as though she was unconsciously dropping clues, each of them hinting at what she was still hiding from us. She found the fight easy, she found the cut not that serious. She obviously had previous fighting experience, but other than that I couldn't figure out much more about her.  
Despite the fact she could have easily hurt us, she didn't. She could have left us the day after the accident happened between Mark and her, but she didn't. Everything about her being a Alpha seemed untrue, minus her abundant strength.  
I didn't understand her at all.  
"So, what were you guys even here for?" Ally said, satisfied with the first aid applied to her. "Dan and Phil were planning to come here for wood, but you guys can't have known about that"  
"We were looking for clothes" answered Tyler.  
"Clothes? For who?"  
"You" I answered. "We thought you might want some different clothes than the loaned clothes from Dan"  
She looked taken aback, as though she had not expected the answer in the least.  
She played with her hair, twirling it around her index finger. She seemed to glance at the floor, unsure what to say.  
"Well, just wait until it's safe to go next time" she told us. "I don't want anything bad to happen to you guys"  
We couldn't agree more with that statement. If this trip was any kind of message, it's that it wasn't safe to go out without Jack, Mark or Ally.  
Jack for his guns skills, Mark for his quick thinking. And Ally for her gun prowess and fighting skills. Despite her still being a stranger, she had helped us after all.  
"Let's head home, shall we?" Tyler asked, sighing in relief.  
"Hold up! While we're here, we should get some wood" Ally said, scanning the stalls. "Scooter and Janey didn't have any"  
"Alright, how many did we need in the end?" asked Connor, joining her in the search.  
"Four, I think" Ally said, her cheerful attitude returning. "Ah! Found it! Now let's hope they didn't mind me being in that fight"  
Ally jogged over to the stall, beckoning for us to follow her. We did so, much more willingly now that she seemed much more trustworthy to us all.  
Who knows, maybe her showing up to our door was the best thing to happen to us lately.

 


	8. Round and Round we go

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Twerking is brought up, but it's ninety percent cringe and ten percent awkward.  
> Actually no, make that a hundred percent of both. No sexy twerking allowed in here D:<

"She isn't going to like it Chris" I sighed, trying to at least halt my enthusiastic friend in his current idea. He didn't even seem to falter slightly in his speed, just grinning at me with a carefree attitude. "Chris, did you hear me?"  
"Hush, she'll love it" He told me, waving away my worries with a mere hand wave.  
To simply explain what was going on, Chris decided that it was best to set up a icebreaker for our newest addition to the family, so that she would feel more comfortable around us all. I had agreed at first, until I had seen the game Chris dragged out of Phil's closet.  
"Chris, playing truth or dare is going to make things awkward" I complained to him, sighing heavily. Usually my loud sighs would at least get him to look my way, but he almost seemed like he was ignoring me right now. "Do you want that?"  
I instantly regretted saying that, as he turned around with a gleeful and mischievous grin on his face.  
"Yes" Chris admitted, shuffling the cards around in his hand. "You know I love awkward"  
I sighed, playing with my fingers as Chris dutifully set up the dining room table for the game. He was nothing, if not determined about this.  
"What if it ends up just being you two?"  
He waggled his eyebrows at me.  
"I make it saucy"  
"Chris, no"  
"Chris yes"  
I heard snickering from up the stairs. When I turned my head, I saw Phil trying (Emphasis on trying) to hide behind a banister of the stairs. Dan was simply standing behind him, giving a smirk to the both of us.  
"I always knew you two had the hots for each other" Dan said, laughing more to himself than anyone else. "But get a room when you do"  
"No, we're talking about truth or dare with Ally" I explained, shoving Chris away who had decided it was a good idea to pretend to kiss me after Dan's comment.  
Dan's face turned slightly sour with that admission from me, as though he had just bitten a lemon.  
"Oh"  
He doesn't hate her that much, does he? Every single mention of her in the past always made him lose his smile, become bristly, you name it.  
"Why don't you play Dan?" Chris asked of him, writing more questions on various pieces of paper for the Truth pile he was setting up. "You'll get to ask her questions and figure out more about her"  
Dan looked down, then up, then down again. He seemed to be having difficulty making up his mind. Either way, it seemed to be enough for Chris that he was even considering it, and he returned to his task of setting up our dining room table. Chris always seems to know what to say to get stubborn people to agree with him. He even would know what to say to me.  
He triumphantly flung his arms around once he was done with the table, showing off the two piles. One was questions, the other being dares for everyone. I suppose that made sense, it would just get boring if you just go around asking the same questions or doing the same dares.  
"We'll play" Came the deep voice of Mark, him and Jack agilely slipping past both Dan and Phil on the stairs. Whatever they seemed to be fixing at the time, they must have been done with it.  
Jack was busy trying to get his newly acquired gun to stay attached to his belt. Apparently they talked about it being too heavy, so it pulls down Jack's pants when he tries to carry it like he did his previous pistol.  
"How come?~ You wanna get a piece of her action?" Chris joked, slipping into his good old teasing personality. Mark didn't seem to mind, chuckling like it was just another day at the office.  
"Can't it simply be that I want to know her better?" Mark replied, chuckling softly. Jack didn't respond to Chris's antics, still fiddling with his gun and trying to get it to stay still. The two of them had already told the rest of us about the heroic rescue that Ally had done, dealing with August easily.  
Phil had explained what had happened even a small bit before that, them going to the garage, only to see Mark and Jack on the way back.  
In fact, once Ally realised that Tyler, Troye and Connor weren't here, she immediately went out to go look for them without anyone having to ask her to do that. Despite it being very rash of her, I did appreciate the fact she seemed legitimately concerned for our well being.  
"Jack, if you keep playing with your pants, it's a sign that you're horny" Dan joked, a grin slipping onto his face as he teased him. However, I could spy that he had that look in his eyes. The one that said he was not comfortable with the situation, and just trying to distract both himself and others.  
Jack suddenly raised his head, as though he had just heard people talking to him. He saw everyone grinning at him, but he didn't seem to understand what was going on.  
"What?"  
"Nothing Jack" Mark responded, slapping his shoulder lightly. "It's not important"  
Jack still seemed confused, but let it go. Both literally and figuratively, the gun clanging against the ground directly behind him.  
"Fuckin piece of shite" He grumbled as he picked it up, but simply held it in his hand instead of his pants. I could understand the dilemma he had, especially when I saw the massive firing chamber that it had. It was massive!  
"Hey Bossanova" asked Chris, using a funny mixture of the word "Cassanova" and "Boss", as Jack often liked to say that he was a boss to the rest of us. Jack's eyes narrowed darkly at Chris, who looked a little confused for a moment before things seemed to click. That name was off limits. "You gonna play?"  
"Depends" Jack said, placing the gun on the dining table. "What is it?"  
"Truth or dare"  
"The tame one or the non tame one?"  
"Wait, there's a non tame one?!"  
Jack rolled his eyes like we were a bunch of children to him, and then proceeded to tell us in great detail the sorts of games he used to play with his old group. In a bit, too much detail...  
"Give head for three minutes?!"  
"Put a...thing in your..thing..."  
"Do naked yoga?"  
"Make me....go... without touching my privates?"  
"Jack yourself off in front of everyone?!"  
Phil looked like he wanted to make a pun, but Jack promptly made him shut up with a well timed glare. Good thing too, as I don't think Jack was in the mood for hearing a sex related pun to do with his name especially after Chris's slip up.  
"We shouldn't do this version" Mark demanded, him not really liking any of the ideas about that version of the game.  
"Why not? Sounds fun to me" said Chris, his grin growing even larger than before.  
"First of all, not everyone will want to play that version" Mark said, his cheeks growing a shade of red. "And Ally would be the only girl, making it very uneven in the boy to girl ratio"  
"That second one doesn't sound like a problem to me" Chris cheekily remarked, clicking his fingers at various people in a sleazy sort of way.  
"Dude, most of us are straight" I chipped in, hoping to steer the course away from the current dangerous one.  
"So is spaghetti until things get steamy" Chris responded, wiggling his eyebrows at me. How typical of him.  
"You'd be fine with giving a dude head?!" Asked Dan incredulously.  
Chris seemed to ponder that for a moment, looking at some of us.  
"Actually, that might make things awkward between us"  
"I thought you loved awkward"  
"Not that awkward"  
With that time bomb defused, we heard the front door opening.  
"Room service~"  
Ally walked in, holding two large wooden beams perched on her right shoulder, only one of her left shoulder.  
"Somebody asked for wood?" Ally asked, winking at the majority of us.  
Chris waggled his eyes at her, her laughing in response.  
"Wait until I put the wood down first" she said as she placed the beams in the corner of the dining room.  
"Where are the guys?"  
"Oh, they're coming through the door" Ally responded, starting to fix her somewhat disheveled hair. "They insisted that they wanted to carry a beam themselves"  
Just as she had said, the three boys came through the door only moments after herself. Only difference was, they looked like they were all exhausted and tired from carrying the beam.  
"How the heck could you carry three of these no problem?!"  
"I got muscles"  
When she finished saying her sentence, she flexed her arms muscles and shoulder muscles. They actually looked pretty impressive, lining well with her figure. Her hips rounded out quite nicely, having strong, long legs that seemed to be able to handle anything.  
"Can I help you PJ?"  
I raised my eyes to her face, realising that she had caught me staring at her figure. Everyone around me was laughing softly at the situation.  
She looked at me, a grin on her face, awaiting to see what I would say.  
"You look good"  
Goddammit brain! That's not what I wanted to say!  
Well, maybe it was. But I was going to change it slightly so it sounded less creepy.  
Her smile softened, looking at my feet instead of my face. She twirled some hair while she blushed slightly.  
"Thanks"  
Chris jabbed me in the ribs, flashing me two thumbs up with a goofy grin on his face. In fact, many people seemed like they were giving me encouragement.  
Jack and Dan didn't, both of them gaining a slight frown. Was it for the same reason? I had no idea.  
"Anyway! Would you like to play truth or dare?" asked Phil, motioning to the table and its contents.  
"Truth or dare huh?" she said, moving closer to take a look at the cards. "I haven't played that game in years"  
"How long ago did you play?"  
"It would be about five years back" Ally answered, looking upwards while trying to think back. "It never went anywhere cause it was always just me and my best friend, Bailey"  
Tyler, Troye and Connor loudly placed the wooden beam they were carrying onto the pile of others that Ally had put down with a loud bang, loud enough that it frightened Phil. I swear, he jumped so high despite the fact he should have seen it happen before his very eyes.  
"Ooh! Are you guys playing truth or dare? I love that game!" Tyler said excitedly, while stretching his shoulder.  
"I guess that means everyone wants to play, huh?" Chris said, jumping with glee. "Awesome!"  
We began sitting at the table, after the front door was shut and the gun was placed safely in Jack's lap.  
Chris had set everything up nicely, even the chairs. He really wanted to play this.  
While Ally sat at one end of the table, everyone else seemed to find their seat in a funny anti clockwise motion. I sat to her right, Chris to my right, Phil to Chris's right and Dan sat to Phil's right.  
On the other side of the table, Mark sat opposite to Ally, smiling warmly at her. He was really trying hard to make her feel welcome, and it didn't go unnoticed by Ally. She returned the smile, although she looked a bit nervous.  
To Mark's right, Jack sat. On Jack's right was Connor. Connor had Troye on his right. And finally, Tyler sat to Troye's right, sitting on the other side of Ally.  
"Alright, so how do we play?" She asked, though her voice seemed to say that she actually was trying to break the ice rather than actually ask for the rules. Regardless, she got the run down of the rules from Chris, who enthusiastically told her.  
"Instead of people choosing, it is that we go in a circle and each pick out what we feel like choosing"  
Ally nodded her head, seemingly understanding the strange instructions.  
"Shall I start?" She asked unsure, seeing the fact that nobody had offered it up before her.  
"Go ahead" Dan said, most likely eager to know more about her. He had his best poker face on, but it still looked like he was frowning at him. or was that just his resting bitch face?  
She picked a question out of the truth pile, flipping it over and reading it. She burst into laughter before anyone had the oppurtnuity to even ask her what was on the card. Naturally, we were even more curious what was on it now.  
"What kind of question is that?!" She asked herself rather than anyone else, her attempts to stop laughing ending in failure.  
"What does it say?"  
"Who do you think has the biggest cock in the room?"  
Everyone besides Ally looked at Chris with a accusatory look. He looked shocked more than anything else.  
"What the hell Chris?!"  
"I didn't write that one!"  
"Bullshit!"  
"I didn't!"  
Ally was too busy laughing to really be mad at Chris.  
"Oh my god" Ally said, her cheeks turning red from laughing. She softly fanned her red hot cheeks, her laughter managing to drop enough for her to at least speak clearly. "Do I have to answer it?"  
"Yes"  
Everyone once again turned to give Chris an accusatory look. He simply shrugged his shoulders in a weird motion.  
"I don't know, Mark?" Ally said unsure, shrugging her shoulders. She obviously had never gotten a question like that in her games with her old friend.  
Mark covered his mouth, seemingly trying to hold back laughter while everyone else lost their damn minds. Once people had calmed down, Ally placed the card back in the pile at the bottom with a nervous laugh.  
"Go PJ" Chris prodded me, shoving an elbow into my ribcage.  
"I know!" I cried out, trying to shove him away first before I did so. Lord knows what he would do if he was peering over my shoulder as I was reading the card. I picked one out of the truth pile as well, earning me a couple of boo's from the guys. "What?"  
"Don't be a pussy!"  
I shook my head, further ignoring them. When I flipped the card, it read "Who is your current crush?".  
Perfect. Just what I needed.  
I glanced over at Ally, wondering how the hell I was going to answer this without freaking her out. She looked over to me, her eyes reflecting a curious attitude.  
"What'd you get?"  
"It's asking what my type of person is" I lied to her, which she seemed to accept. A couple of other people nodded their heads, liking the question. Chris however, looked confused, giving me a funny side glance.  
"I didn't write one like that" Chris whispered to me, raising an eyebrow. I made a hand motion to tell him to be quiet, him just shrugging his shoulders in response.  
"I suppose my type is the adventurous" I lied again, which people seemed to accept once again. Ally raised her eyebrow, but didn't say anything to give any indication. Did I answer good or bad?  
"Now, because I am not a pussy" said Chris, reaching for the dare pile. "I am going to do a dare"  
He quickly read it, placing it back in the pile almost immediately.  
"This one's boring" Chris huffed, his cheeks expanding rapidly before using it all to blow a single hair out of his eyes. "It was to get picked up bridal style"  
"Dude, we've tried before with me" Jack reminded us with a sigh, obviously not understanding why the card was still in the pile. The last time we had tried, it ended in disaster. "We're not strong enough"  
"I am" Ally said, and then hurriedly found that she had to add something onto the end to avoid sounding creepy. "I mean, if Chris is comfortable with that"  
Chris stood up hurriedly, waving his arms in a "come at me bro!" movement. He looked like a utter tool. And yet, she didn't seem phased at all, simply standing up and smoothly moving to him and hooking her left arm under his knees.  
"Alright, now just lean back" She informed him, her right arm already outstretched to catch him should he do it suddenly. Despite her looking like the most confident person in the world, he wasn't really all that confident looking anymore.  
"Have you done this before?" He asked her nervously, his laughter becoming louder the more time went on.  
"Yeah, I have"  
"How many times?"  
"I dunno, once?"  
Chris froze. He almost looked like a statue, if statues had the ability to be afraid.He looked over to her, which responded with a serious response, not making fun of him in the slightest. She didn't rush him, didn't make fun of him at all. Just... waited.  
He took a deep breath in, finally deciding to trust her enough to lean back like she had told him to do. Within seconds, her right arm had securely wrapped around his back and tightly held onto his chest. Once she had him fully in her arms, she simply extended her legs and let him dangle there.  
Chris let out a funny noise, some weird frightened yelp as he grabbed around her neck for support, but his fright quickly seemed to go away with her confident grip. Once he fully relaxed, there they were.  
His legs dangled off her left arm, his shoulder brought close to her chest. She didn't seem at all fazed by his weight, instead looking at him with concern in her eyes.  
It was almost like she was looking at a younger brother, carrying them home after a long day.  
"Is it still scary?" She asked him, but he shook it off with a gentle head shake. The rest of us stared in awe, mesmerized by the display of the two of them. It was like watching a corny romance film, if you had swapped around the genders of who was carrying who.  
"Hey Chris!" said Phil, snapping the most of us out of our daze. "Do you feel pretty yet?"  
Chris was also snapped out of his daze, looking away from Ally and over to everyone at the table. He placed his hands under his chin, fluttering his eyelashes at the lot of us.  
"Am I beautiful?" He joked with us, which finally made us aware that he was perfectly fine. With that thought in our minds, we were allowed to finally be ourselves. And by which, I meant we laughed at the both of them as she gently rocked him in her arms. She seemed to find it funny as well, chuckling with the continued antics of Chris.  
"You want to get down now?" Ally asked after a while, smiling down at him in her arms.  
"I dunno to be honest" Chris responded, scratching his chin in thought. "This is pretty comfortable after all"  
She laughed, before walking over to his chair, placing him down on it. I guess he didn't get much choice in the matter.  
"As much as it might be fun to carry you around all day, the game still needs to be played, right?" She reminded him, moving back to her chair next to me. Chris pretended to be upset for a brief second, but it was obviously fake. After everyone had calmed down enough, he tapped Phil on his shoulder, reminding him that it was his turn.  
"Your turn man"  
"Alright" Phil giggled, moving his hand to take a card from the dare pile. This wasn't normal for him at all, and Dan seemed to be the first to bring that up.  
"Dude, I thought you hated dares"  
"I do, but I hoped the dares had changed"  
Dan shrugged his shoulders, giving an uninterested look. Phil looked at him for a while longer, waiting to see if he would say anything else. When he didn't, Phil simply returned to the card he had picked out.  
"Twerk on the person opposite from you" Phil read out, looking at the card as though it had sprouted legs and started walking.  
Phil raised his head, looking across from himself, seeing Troye. Troye laughed, before giving him a small wave.  
"Why?!"  
"Do it"  
"Come on man!"  
Phil covered his face in his hands, his cheeks turning a dark shade of red.  
"What does twerk mean?" Ally asked, earning a whole bunch of confused looks at her.  
"You don't know what twerk means?"  
"Nope"  
Oh shoot.

(Ally)  
  
Everyone stared at me, them confused how I could not know what this "Twerk" means. Was it a candy?  
No, that couldn't be. They used it as a verb.  
"So, what does it mean?" I asked, looking at Phil. I figured he'd know it better than anyone else, seeing as he was the one who got the card in the first place.  
"Ya don't wanna know" Jack answered, looking at me with a serious face.  
"Go Phil!" Chris said, raising his arms excitedly. "Show her what it means!"  
"Noo! I don't want to!" Phil wailed, holding himself meekly.  
I simply looked confused. It seemed to be something either very embarrassing or sexual, thus Phil's reaction of complete denial.  
Everyone suddenly got quieted down, when Jack slid his phone across the table towards me. A video was loaded on the screen, waiting for me to press the play button.  
"That video is of someone twerking" Jack told me, pointing to his phone with a sigh. "Just don't say I didn't warn you"  
I picked the phone up, pressing the play button instantly. He had turned off the volume, so it was only me, Tyler and P.J. who could see what was going on.  
It was a video of a woman who seemed to be rubbing her butt against a man's nether region. It looked weird, not at all sexual in my opinion.  
I could see why it was considered embarrassing though.  
"It looks kind of like grinding" I answered, thinking of the time my former boss took me to a night club. For business of course, stop looking at me like that. Tyler peered over my shoulder, making a face at the twerking on the phone.  
"Yeah, I suppose it does" Tyler agreed with me. "Except grinding can be nice, especially when done slowly"  
"You sound like you have personal experience" I joked with him, not sure how I was supposed to take his comment in any other way.  
"Of course, I totally go to all the clubs" Tyler joked back, which made me feel way more at ease.  
Phil was still wallowing in self-pity, refusing everyone's comments about how he had to do the dare.  
"Can't I change it?"  
"No, you picked the card!"  
"I don't mean the card! I mean the dare" Phil explained, fixing his dishevelled hair. "Can I change it to something like sitting on his lap instead?"  
I felt bad for the guy, so I immediately was fine with the idea of changing it to something he was more comfortable with.  
It looked like many people agreed with me on that standpoint, them nodding their heads in approval.  
"Alright, fine" Chris said, giving in to everyone's wishes. "But you have to stay on his lap until it is his turn!"  
Phil took that as part of it, grateful for the change of dare. It looked kind of awkward, tall and skinny Phil trying to sit on the shortish and skinny Troye.  
Phil decided it was better to have both his legs dangling over the side, sitting side on. Troye shifted him slightly, Phil grabbing his shoulder in support when he did so.  
"Comfy?" asked Dan, giving a smirk to both men.  
"It feels kinda weird" Phil admitted, with a shy smile.  
Troye was busy squirming under Phil, obviously not used to the weight of him.

"This is definitely not my fetish" Troye grumbled underneath Phil, which caused him to laugh. Despite the squirming, the both of them didn't seem too uncomfortable with it.  
Dan quickly grabbed a truth, most likely not wanting a weird dare like Chris and Phil.  
"Have you ever considered a threesome?" Dan said, looking at Chris with a bored look. "Really dude?"  
"Come on! Truth or dare is fun when these things are asked and done!"  
Dan shook his head, laughing softly at the strange question and possibly Chris's mentality on the game.  
"To answer that one, the answer is no" Dan said, placing the card back in the pile. "Not now, and not ever"  
"Alright! Go Markimoo!"  
"Markimoo?"  
"It's one of Mark's nicknames"  
"Oh, alright"  
When I looked over to Mark, he was looking at a card. I assumed it to be a dare, due to the back saying dare in big letters.  
Once he was done, he looked up at me and then back to the card.  
"Shit" Mark mumbled to himself.  
"What's it say?" Connor asked, who was done re-positioning his chair.  
Mark didn't say a word, continuing to look back and forth between me and the card.  
Jack leaned over, peering at the card. Once he saw it, his eyes widened a fraction.  
"Kiss the person sitting across from you" Jack read out.  
Whatever small conversations might have gone on around the table stopped the moment the sentence rang out.  
Some people looked at me, some looked at Mark. Everyone seemed to find the dare not appropriate due to what happened between Mark and me on the first day.  
Or maybe that was what I simply thought, I didn't fully know.  
"I don't think Mark is comfortable with it" I admitted, looking to Chris, who seemed to be mostly in charge of the game. "Do you think we could change it for him?"  
"No, it's fine" Mark said, standing up from his chair.  
He walked around the side that Jack, Connor, Troye, Phil and Tyler sat. Once he got close enough to me, he placed a shaky hand on my shoulder.  
"You sure?" I asked of him, using my quietest and calmest voice as to not scare him.  
He nodded his head, his hair sweeping across his forehead before returning to its original place. His lip seemed to show his true emotion, it shaking slightly as he opened it.  
"Are you okay with it?" Came out the quietest voice I had heard from a man in a long time.  
I returned his earlier nod, signifying my willingness for him to go ahead.  
He moved his hand from my shoulder over to my cheek, the contact feeling like adrenaline. His hands felt very warm. Warm and rough, as though he had spent a lot of time doing manual labour.  
I looked into his eyes, warm and filled with caring despite having a hint of fright in them.  
"What do you want me to do?" I asked him.  
"This might sound stupid" Mark said, swallowing before he continued. "But, can you close your eyes?"  
I obliged, closing my eyes. Every one of my old senses kicked in, trying to force my eyes open and not trust him.  
I did my best to ignore them all, instead focusing on my other senses.  
I could suddenly hear everyone around me, despite the fact nobody was actually speaking. I could hear people's breathing, some were breathing nervously. It was like my body had kicked into overdrive with the lack of sight.  
I had obviously waited too long before taking my next suppressant, my lack of vision sparking my sensitive nose awake.  
But it wasn't a garbled mess as it was before. I could smell each person individually, everyone smelling heavenly in their own right.  
Mark smelled like pine and whisky, the whisky making a nice bitter to combat the aromatic pine.  
PJ, who was to my right, smelled like honey and cinnamon. Honey made him smell sweet, but not too sweet. The cinnamon blended with the honey to make a very warm autumny feeling.  
Tyler, who sat to my left, smelled like cotton candy and lollipops. His scent wasn't overly sweet, hanging around in the air as though it was a candy flavoured mist.  
Chris had a distinct smell, smelling like lavender and rice. The lavender part of him was so nice, I wanted to fall asleep with a mere whiff. The rice was one I didn't expect, but it made for a nice stable part of him to go with his lavender.  
Troye and Phil were a bit harder to tell apart, due to their vicinity to each other, but they had such distinct smells that I could tell a mile away.  
Troye smelled like those candied mints and aloe vera. The mints made for a refreshing smell mixed with a hint of sweet, while the aloe vera brought the mint back so that it wasn't overpowering.  
Phil smelled like apple juice and caramel, them blending together into a single lovely scent of slightly sour with sweet tones.  
Connor smelled like lemon and cumin, having both distinct smells play around with each other. The lemon was mostly sour, but mingled well with the earthy smell of the cumin.  
Dan smelled like chocolate and beetroot. Chocolate was no doubt the stronger of the two, but if you dug deeper, you would find the beetroot inside.  
And Jack smelled like cookies and lettuce. I wasn't sure how the two would get along at first, but when I smelled more, I could smell the lettuce making a fresh contrast to the over powering sweet from the cookies.  
Everyone smelled like heaven, me being able to tell their class from a mere single breeze that contained their scents.  
Jack, Chris, PJ, Connor and Tyler were all Beta, their smell being the least strong out of all class types. Mark, Dan, Phil and Troye were each Omega, their smell being the most overpowering out of the class types.  
Just as I tried to get myself to calm down, I felt a pair of lips on mine. They didn't remain long, lasting for only a second or two.  
But I could feel the warmth and intensity from it even after they left, leaving me in a state of adrenaline high. In fact, I could feel my hormones from my heat start to kick in.   
My eyes opened suddenly, giving Mark a bit of a fright.  
My nose was working in full swing, my hormones starting to begin as well.  
"I'm sorry, my heat accidentally kicked in" I rushed out, scrambling out of my chair and Mark's grip. "I need to go and get my suppressants and take some now"  
I heard a lot of protests, some out of surprise, some out of concern. I ignored them all as I ran around the table and up the stairs to my room.  
I opened the door quickly, shutting it firmly behind me. How did this even happen? I had taken my second suppressant today!  
Stupid oversensitive nose and stupid sensitive hormones. I was actually enjoying that game.  
I grabbed the nearest suppressant, gulping it back dry. Once I was satisfied that I had taken it correctly and I could feel it starting to kick in, I moved over to the door, hoping to tell them that I was going to retire for the day.  
I was stopped in my tracks when I heard a knock at my door.  
"Hey Ally, it's Mark"  
He had seemed to fully compose himself, for I could hear no shakiness or fear in his voice.  
"Hey Mark" I responded, deciding not to open my door just in case. "Sorry about that, I didn't plan to run out at that moment"  
"Don't worry, I know you didn't" Mark told me, chuckling softly. "Do you need to head to bed now? I know how much suppressants suck"  
"Yeah, sorry" I told him through my door. "Can you apologize to the others for me?"  
"No need, they can all hear you right now"  
Really?! Shit.  
"I think we all want to thank you for something today, if you have a moment" Mark said, and I heard a whole bunch of shuffling feet outside my door.  
"Hiya! It's Phil" I heard Phil say. "I wanted to thank you for coming with me and Dan down to the garage, I found it quite fun!"  
"Hey, It's Dan" Dan said, not so loud as Phil. "Sorry about being rude to you today, you know, yeah"  
Dan seemed to find it more awkward than Phil, seemingly having difficulty apologizing to me.  
"Jack here" came the accent that I recognized instantly. "Thanks for saving me and Mark from August, and for being generally awesome"  
"What's up! Tyler here" came the chipper voice from Tyler. "I wanted to thank you for giving us all a chance to get to know you better"  
"Hey, Troye here" Troye said. "You were really great when you saved us from those bandits"  
"Connor here" Connor said, following immediately after Troye. "Thanks for bringing back all those wooden planks with us and helping us with so much"  
"It's ya boy Chris!" Chris said, sounding the most excited. "That truth or dare game was awesome! It's better than any other we've had"  
I laughed, leaning against the door as I heard the rest.  
"Hi, It's PJ" PJ said. "I honestly think you're really nice and caring, so thanks for being you"  
"And I'll finish I guess, but I don't need to introduce myself" Mark's voice came, him being the final one to speak. "I suppose I just wanted to thank you for trusting us, protecting us and simply staying with us"  
I smiled softly, despite the fact none of them would see it.  
"Thank you guys" I responded, wanting to thank them as much as they had done me. "For looking past the fact I am an Alpha, past the fact I was a stranger and past what I might have done"  
I heard a chorus of "you're welcome", them all being a little jumbled into each other. Despite this, it still felt good and its meaning got across.  
"Goodnight"  
They all returned the same farewell, all of them starting to move and do the things they had planned.  
I was right. This place was full of nice people.  
I'm so glad I found this place.

 


	9. You raise me up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A character goes in minor detail about how they were sexually assaulted, so be careful if you don't like that subject

  
Morning came by a lot faster this time than last night, and I was grateful for the decent sleep I had this time. I guess the least I could do for these guys is make something resembling breakfast. And preferably not burning down the house while I'm doing so. After all, my former boss did manage to teach me about proper cooking despite how little time we found for it.  
Walking into the dining room, I noticed quickly that the table had been cleared of the game from the previous night, but that wasn't really what caught my eye.  
Mark was working out near the dining table, a towel being the only thing on his upper body.  
The towel was slung over one of his shoulders nonchalantly while he lifted a weight smoothly in one arm. The rest of his muscles all tensed and curled with every rep he did, and it was like I was watching a work of art rather than a sweaty man work out. He lifted a heavy weight in his right arm, probably just using the one weight for both arms and hands. His skin seemed to glisten with a thin sheen of sweat, making each muscle and ripple stand out that much more.  
It's like he was completely unaware of the effect he had on people, me being a prime example.  
When he lifted the weight, you could hear him take a deep breath in, his chest rising and falling in perfect sync as he worked. I could only figure that this was common for him, everything all being done with a calm demeanor to it.  
He was taking muscle training seriously, despite the fact as an Omega it would be twice as hard as a Beta. Alpha took to muscle training like it was a joke. Most Alpha would simply have difficulty finding a weight that really challenged their muscles.  
Some Alpha would even go out and lift their car or a couple of heavy rocket launchers. It usually didn't do much for us.  
"Good morning" Mark greeted with a grunt, drawing me out of my thoughts. Oh, so he had noticed me here. I was honestly surprised that he hadn't spoken up before, and it took me a little longer than I would have liked to clear my throat and speak clearly. Even then, I sounded nervous and slightly fidgety.  
"Good morning" I replied, trying to make it seem like I wasn't staring at him the moment before. He smirked at me, purposely looking at me while he did another couple of reps. It's like he was aware of what he was doing, which honestly just made me more confused than turned on. Well, no, that wasn't completely correct, I was definitely turned on but my mind seemed to be battling with another part of my emotions. My confusion.  
I couldn't figure out whether the guy was nervous around me or was just not used to physical contact. At one point, he would be flirty and friendly. The next, he would be a frightened lamb that I was afraid of breaking with a mere touch or word.  
"So, why the muscle training?" I asked curiously, playing with my hair while I tried my best to focus just on his face. It wasn't like that part of him wasn't attractive, but it made me look like less of a creep. "Surely it isn't easy?"  
"It definitely isn't" Mark responded, returning his focus back to the weight. "But I want to protect the guys here, and that goes much easier when you are stronger"  
I nodded, understanding the sentiment very much myself. I felt the same myself for many years, before the incident that ruined it all.  
I moved closer to him to inspect the weight in his hands, wanting to see how heavy the weight was. It said that it was about twenty-five kg, and I let out a small hum of approval. He noticed this, and followed my gaze for a brief moment to try and understand what I was approving of.  
"Not bad" I commented on the weight, even making the conscious effort to point at the thing I was mentioning. "How does it feel for you?"  
"Like I'm trying to lift a car battery" Mark responded while laughing. "It feels fucking heavy"  
"Can I try?"  
"Go ahead" He told me before he held out the weight to me. Taking it from him was pretty easy even without a proper grip, and I gave it a few experimental lifts in the way he had been doing it.  
"And? How does it feel for you?" Mark asked me curiously, looking over my own muscles like I had done for him. It made me feel a little self conscious with his gaze, but I figure it was only fair since I had done the same to him.  
"Like I'm lifting a full soda can" I answered him easily, while doing more curls. In truth, I had tossed up the idea of lying to him so I didn't potentially hurt his feelings, but I chickened out at the last minute.  
"What?! Seriously?!"  
"Yup"  
He looked intensely at my arm while I did a couple more curls, trying to see how my muscles worked. His lips were tightly pressed to each other as he seemed to mull everything over, and I started to slow down my reps with the lack of stimulation. After all, it was actually about the weight of a full soda can back before my muscles had developed in my maturing phase, so it bored me greatly. Not that I would ever dare to say I was bored with something he struggled with.  
"You're strong as heck" Mark said, focusing on my face after a while instead of my arm. "But nobody would guess that when they simply glance at you"  
"I know right? I love the part when they think they can easily take me out and get their ass beat" I told him without really thinking, then suddenly wishing I could take my words back the moment I spoke them out loud. God, I sounded like a war loving barbarian.  
"I'll bet!" Mark said, looking at me with respect in his eyes. Despite my crude tone and words, he didn't seem like he was all that bothered by them. "No wonder you could lift Chris so easily yesterday"  
"Yeah, Jack said something about how you guys had tried with him before and failed?" I asked him, trying to remember if that was correct. It was Jack that had been the one that they tried to lift, right? And I think it must have been Mark who had tried to lift him, what with him being the strongest in this place after all.  
"Yup, I had tried to lift him bridal style" Mark said while laughing, a big grin on his face as he remembered the memory in his mind. "Needless to say, it ended catastrophically"  
I honestly could imagine that happen, as most people didn't know how to do it properly. There was a time I thought so too, trying to lift people from their legs first or have them lie down on the ground and have it go all lopsided. But the thought of the both of them failing to carry each other like pretty princess's was funny enough that I chuckled out loud.  
I hurriedly covered my mouth, hoping I hadn't offended him with that. They might have gotten hurt trying that after all, I didn't know. But no, he just laughed along with me, it sounding more like he was happy that I found it funny than that it was gut busting levels of hilarious.

"Then again, I'm sure you could lift anybody" Mark mentioned as he thought it over, but he soon changed his mind when he saw my unsure look. "What, is there someone you aren't able to lift?"  
"Oh, no, that's not what I was thinking of really" I answered him honestly, once again playing with my hair in an effort to keep my fidgety hands busy. Dude was still shirtless in front of me after all. "I was just thinking in the back of my mind that you could probably lift me"  
"You think so? How much do you weigh?" He asked me, his attention soon shifting to looking over my entire body to try and guess how much I weighed. "Around seventy kilograms?"  
"Close, try about fifteen kilograms lighter, closer to fifty-five"  
He looked me up and down once more, probably trying to judge if he actually could lift me. My mind briefly seemed to think that he was checking me out for other reasons, but I quickly scolded my inner child and threw that possibility out of the metaphorical window.  
"I noticed the way you lifted up Chris was different than the way I tried it" Mark told me from memory, trying to cross reference both instances in his mind. It didn't surprise me all that much that he had gotten it wrong, as most people didn't quite get it right on the first go. "I got him to lie on the ground and tried to pick him up from that. It was quite embarrassing to find out that I wasn't able to actually right myself and I accidentally fell on top of him when I lost my balance"  
"Beginners mistake" I laughed a little at the mix-up he made, grateful once I saw that he was alright with my possibly ill timed chuckle. "I'd suggest that you do my method until you find one that suits you better. You want to try it on me?"  
"You mean lifting you?" He joked, but I missed the joke in first instance. I quickly retorted, but only later figure out he was ribbing me.  
"Of course, what else would I be talking about?" I asked him, before it finally hit home. "Oh"  
He started giggling like he had made the most hilarious joke in the world, and I couldn't resist the urge to giggle along with him. Honestly, was he afraid of me or flirty with me? I was hoping he was going to tell me sooner rather than later which category I belonged to. I had attended the 'How to shoot your enemies dead' class rather than the 'How in the ever loving fluff do people work' class after all.  
"Geez, you act like you are mature" I halfheartedly chastised him. I was going to lightly punch his chest, before I reminded myself of his state of undress. It looked a little stupid, my closed fist reaching out halfway to his chest before it suddenly veered back over to my side, but he didn't seem to notice it.  
"Haha, sorry, sorry"  
We spent a good couple of seconds simply laughing at the joke, our joy quite obvious to each other. It was a serene feeling, one that I had missed dearly in the two months I had been on my own.   
"Alright, so I'll probably just steal your method of lifting people to lift you" Mark made up his mind, before realising that he hasn't actually gotten a verbal consent from me yet. "I mean, if that's alright with you"  
"Of course" I answered him quite happily, and I waited patiently for him to gently take away the weight still in my hands and place it and the towel on the dining table nearby. Like I had done, he placed his left arm under my knee, preparing to lift me. He paused once he was ready, almost as if he wasn't quite sure he was doing it correctly.  
He looked at me a bit apprehensively, but he seemed to relax when I nodded my head at him. My confidence in him seemed to be enough, despite how little I thought he really needed it.  
"A-Alright, now lean back" Mark almost said confidently, him obviously not really liking the stutter at the beginning of his sentence. He obviously wanted to come across as more confident than he had, but I knew he was as ready as he could be.  
So, this is either going to land me and Mark into a pile or it's going to be fine. I had to admit, I hadn't been picked up like this in a long time. Well, there's no time like the present to find out.  
I leaned back like he instructed me to do, and I could feel the way my hair whipped around my head for a moment in that brief moment. It felt like I was falling for much longer than I probably was, the lack of an arm at first frightening me more than I cared to admit. But soon I felt the reassuring pressure of his warm arm supporting my back, the open hand quickly holding securely to my shoulder. A quick grunt came out of his lips as he used my momentum to swing my legs up into the air.  
And then there we were. I was comfortably nestled in his arms, my legs and hair dangling off either side of him. My head was resting against the might that was his shoulder, and I could probably have made out all the little parts of his scent if I had my nose properly working.  
For a moment, he simply stood there, as though it hadn't hit him yet that he was holding me correctly. He looked about as dumbfounded as I felt at first, but I was happy to admit that I was the first one to break the stunned silence.  
"Good job" I congratulated him, giggling softly while patting his shoulder. That was enough to break the spell on him, and he turned his head to look down at me.  
It didn't take long before a gleeful smile covered his features, it soon being accompanied by a laugh that sounded like a mixture of a squeal and a giggle. His happiness was infectious, and I couldn't help but giggle once again to show how happy I was as well.  
Once I returned his giggle, he gently started to swing me around like he was trying to rock me to sleep in his arms. I had chalked it up to him just being extremely happy or just being curious about whether he could actually manage to do that as well.  
Either way, he was happy. I was happy. If the others were there, I wonder if they would have been as happy as we were right then? I don't think so, this was something that neither of us had managed to do, and it was something special that we now shared in this moment in time. The whole effect behind it probably would have not worked the same if everyone was there like at the game of truth and dare last night.  
As much as I could have stayed in that happy atmosphere forever, it seemed to not last as long as I would have liked. Most notably, I could notice his smile falter after a while of looking down at me. No, it was more than that, as he even started having difficulty with meeting my eyes.  
"Is something wrong?" I asked him, not sure if it was something I had done. Or was it something that I couldn't help, like reminding him of a younger sister or lover?  
"You've probably noticed that I always was nervous when I was touching you before" He admitted, his arms returning to the gentle rocking motion that he was doing before. But this one was slower, gentler, one made to set someone at ease rather than convey happiness like the other one had accomplished. "It wasn't because of what happened on the first day or anything like that, it was because you were an Alpha"  
I had suspected as much, but it still felt like a stab to the heart. He did seem honestly sorry for feeling that way, so I honestly couldn't say I was mad at him for feeling that.  
"It's a stupid reason to be afraid of someone" Mark said, looking like he was going to cry. "And I wanted to apologize for that"  
He moved over to a nearby chair, trying his best to put me down on it. He missed it a bit, half my butt hanging off the side, but it was close enough. When he manged to put me down and was satisfied that I wasn't going to topple off, he moved away from me. Something about the way he moved told me there was something missing in the story he had told me, something that made his movements to be slower and more somber. Could it...have something to do with that thing I had noticed yesterday?  
"Mark?"  
"What's up?" Responded Mark, his back turned to me at that time. He had begun to towel himself down, trying to remove the worst of the sweat before he was likely going to take a shower or something similar.  
"I saw a wanted poster of you yesterday"  
He froze, the towel paused at his neck. He didn't move for a good couple of seconds, a wary question being the only sound me made.  
"...What did it look like?"  
"It had a photo of you on it, but not much else" I said, recounting the wanted poster the best I could. "You looked very beaten up in the photo"  
He released a deep sigh, but not in relief. It was the exact opposite, it sounded like it was a sigh of regret.  
"What happened to you that has made you so afraid of Alpha?" I pushed once more, seeing his shoulders droop. Part of me wanted to know what I was supposed to avoid, while the rest of me felt like the biggest prick in the universe for sticking my nose in.  
Despite my question and his somber tone, he didn't address it at first. It seemed like he was trying to delay it as much as possible, at first just focusing on drying himself off. Shortly after, his gaze seemed to sweep around broadly for something that he didn't have with him. I presumed it to be for a shirt, as he gave up quickly once be couldn't find one.  
Even the task of finding a seat seemed to be stretched out far longer than what was necessary, but I decided to write it off as me simply being impatient rather than him dodging the issue. Even if he was, I wanted to give him the time he needed. I would have given him hours if he needed, but it soon became apparent that he didn't need to. He leaned his elbows against the dining table, and began to speak.  
"Do you know this neighbourhood well?" He asked me softly, and I shook my head slowly. "I see. Well, to make a long story short, there's a bandit group around here that's run by a guy called Bossanova. Rowdy guy, does what he wants, the usual"  
"Yeah" I added in, but I couldn't escape the feeling that my words were empty and shallow. I had a sneaking suspicion that I knew where this was going, and if I was right then my simple words would do little. I guess I just wanted to say something than just leave him speaking on his own, let him know I really was listening to him.  
He nodded his head, his adam's apple bobbing up and down with a nervous swallow. I couldn't tell if his nodding was his way of showing he was happy that I spoke, or just was a nervous tick of his. Either way, I didn't push any further. He didn't need that.  
"He was...No, is an Alpha. And he wasn't a very nice person" Mark said, his voice wavering from time to time. Some words seemed to come out harder than others, and he would stop and start like he was trying to patch together a sentence that had been broken. "He did..."  
I didn't push him to answer, horrified with the treatment of Mark. What person would hurt such a nice person?  
That being said, how did he still find the courage to be nice to me? To any Alpha?  
"...He did bad things to me"  
I wasn't happy at all. In the end, my guess had ended up hitting the mark dead on, but it didn't feel right. If anything, I had wanted to be wrong.  
Mark couldn't say anything more, covering his mouth and shutting his eyes tightly. I didn't need much imagination to understand what kind of things had been done to him. A couple of tears slid down his face, him just quietly sobbing on the chair.  
Honestly, what was I supposed to do make him feel better? To let him know that I wasn't going to judge him for this? My first instinct was to stand up and hug him, hold him close and safe in my arms. But I knew that wouldn't do anything, I was part of that class that he hated so much. I was a part of that section of humanity that had hurt him, and I had nearly repeated the same thing just two nights ago.  
I was not the right person to help him.  
"...Do you want me to leave you alone?" I asked him softly, expecting him to nod his head. It was what most people wanted when I asked them that question after all. And if they didn't answer, I would usually assume that to be a yes, and leave them be until they felt comfortable to talk to me again. Imagine my surprise when I see his head shake in a definite no. "You don't?...Then, what do you want me to do?"  
"What do you want me to do?"  
He opened his mouth at first, but shut it after a couple of sobs were the only noise. He took a deep breath and tried once more, this time to at least get his words across.  
"I-I don-hup-don't know....."  
"...Do you want me to hug you?" I asked him, the more rational part of my brain practically yelling at me for asking such a stupid question. The feelings in my mind were warring against the rational, and obviously my feelings of wanting to help him overtook my thoughts of giving him his space. To my surprise, he nodded his head to this offer, and I suddenly felt very unsure how I was supposed to actually make him feel better.  
I tried to not overthink it too much, just focusing on hugging the poor guy rather than standing there on whether or not this was considered going way too far for being casual acquaintances. I stood up from my chair and walked the short distance he was away from me, moving my arms around his torso to make him feel safe. Before I could actually really get my arms properly there, his own arms quickly finding their way around my back and holding me close to him.  
I ended up in a weird position, due to the fact I couldn't really sit down unless I wanted to sit on his lap. And because I considered that to be super inappropriate when you're trying to console someone, I looked super weird. My back was bent over while my legs were straight,so it looked more like I was hovering over him than actually trying to console him. Not to mention, it felt like someone was wreaking havoc on my back.  
I tried to reposition myself, so as to not destroy my back but Mark must have taken this the wrong way, thinking I was going to leave him. He clung to me even tighter, nearly making the both of us topple the chair over where we stood. I released a single arm to grab onto the dining table to we didn't smack into the floor, and weighed up my odds on what to do.  
Option one, sit on his lap and look like a total slut. Option two, stubbornly refuse to do so and continue to hover him and wreck your back/knock each other to the floor by accident. I sighed softly to myself, but soon I gently lifted my legs to sit on his lap. Now with proper room to actually hold him, I made sure to fully envelop his body with as much of my own.I wrapped my legs around his waist, focusing more on Mark than the situation.  
He seemed almost like a child, clinging to his mother, his sobs muffled by my collar bone and hair. It was likely going to actually need to be washed afterwards, but I honestly couldn't have cared less right then. He needed me, and I was perfectly comfortable to hold him there.  
I simply sat there, for what seemed to be the longest couple of hours of my life, my hands rubbing comforting circles in his back. In the end, I was holding the sobbing mess that was Mark. And that was fine.


	10. Bang bang bang

"Alright, there we go"  
" 'ush! You'll wake 'im"  
Jack had woken up just a bit later than me and Mark, seeing the situation that we had gotten ourselves stuck in. Thankfully, he hadn't reacted like those cliche anime where the person freaks out and starts slapping people like crazy. That would have ended badly for Mark. And me, cause I probably would have slapped him back on reflex.  
Jack simply ended up moving the weight and towel away, and simply remaining quiet in the background. It didn't seem as though he was too surprised at the breakdown, just sad that it had happened. As though it had at least happened once before...  
Once Mark had gone to sleep in my arms, Jack helped me move him back to his room. And by help, I mean he opened the door to Mark's room. I ended up carrying him myself, as I already was holding him at the time. Not to mention Mark's comments on how he was the strongest one in this building (Before me) and that he failed to carry someone bridal style like I was doing so effortlessly.  
Jack closed the door as quietly as he could once I had tucked Mark into bed, soon afterwards looking at me apprehensively.  
" 'e told ya, didn't 'e?" Jack asked, concern in his voice. My guess had been correct, at least knowing that Jack already knew about this before hand. "About the bandit boss"  
"Yeah, he did" I decided to tell him the truth, as lying about it wouldn't do any good for either of us. At least now Jack would know about it, and maybe be able to talk to him about his fear of Alpha. It likely wouldn't do well for Mark to talk it over with me after all, I am an Alpha.  
Jack sighed, crossing his arms over his chest. He seemed to be quite hesitant to talk about it himself, but he eventually managed to find the right words.  
"They all didn't know what to do when 'e told them" Jack admitted, his blue eyes starting to get moisture as well. "We just kind of 'ugged 'im and patted 'is back"  
"There isn't much you can do in that sort of situation" I admitted, remembering a similar situation in the past. And yet, I couldn't help but get stuck on that specific word he used. 'They', which meant that when Mark had told the rest of the residents at the motel, that Jack knew already?... How strange.  
"Yeah, I guess yer right" Jack agreed with me, sighing softly again. When he uncrossed his arm, he shifted his weight onto the other foot, and I could hear a loud  _clunk_ on the ground right behind him. He swore under his breath, grumbling as he bent down to pick up the item he had dropped. The gun from August. "Feckin' thing won't stay put"  
"That's cause it isn't a gun you can just place at the back of your pants" I lectured, feeling like I was talking to a young kid. I mean, that was the basics of keeping a gun, so how didn't he really know about it? My best guess was that he never had a gun that was as heavy as this one, which meant he must be better at pistols or easily carried rifles. "You put in a gun holster on your hip or chest"  
"I don't 'ave one of those" Jack mumbled softly to himself, almost pouting at my tone towards him. "We've never really 'ad the need for one of them. 'sides, doesn't a gun 'olster stand out way too much?"  
"Holding the gun 24/7 in your hand stands out way more" I pointed out, to which he seemed to reluctantly agree. "Heck, we can even just go out and take a holster off a nearby bandit"  
"Why is mugging someone yer first option?" He asked me, trying to have a serious face when he asked that, but I could see the smile breaking through his facade.  
"I assumed you guys didn't really have enough money to buy one" I said, shrugging my shoulders. "Or that you guys considered it a waste of money, but it's essentially the same thing"  
"Well, yeah. We don't really 'ave enough money to buy one off the market stalls as they are usually way too pricey for us"  
"So how about I go get one for you guys instead?" I offered for him, flexing my bicep in front of him to get those complaints about me not being strong enough out of the way. "I'm sure there's likely going to be one guy right around the corner or something"  
"No! Everyone would be upset if ya got 'urt!" Jack exclaimed, which made me hurriedly shush him with a finger on my lips. We were still standing in front of Mark's door after all. I had to admit, it sort of hurt to hear him say 'everyone' instead of 'I'. It gave me the impression that he didn't care what actually happened to me, but that he just was worried about what others thought.  
"Dude, I defeated about twenty when I saved Tyler and the others yesterday" I scoffed, the notion of me getting sounding quite laughable. I guess now was not the time to mention that I actually injured myself yesterday when I had saved those three. "A guy with a gun is usually a lot easier to handle than you think, as they get really cocky and stupid"  
Speaking of cocky and stupid, I was getting the distinct impression that Jack would have described me with those words, his gaze fixed on me with a disapproving look in his eyes. In a way, the both of us were very similar, both very stubborn and more likely to butt heads with someone than admit that they might have a point about the subject.  
"I'm serious man, I know what I'm doing when I’m fighting" I said while rolling my eyes at him.  
"Now that ye mention it, Tyler did say something like that when ye rescued them" Jack said, narrowing his eyes at me. "What did ya do as a job before now?"  
"I was a bodyguard for my former boss" I answered truthfully, hoping to leave certain parts out without sounding dodgy. "I didn't want to tell you guys, cause I thought you would not trust me if I told you that"  
"What company did ye work fer?" Jack asked, his blue eyes staring intently at me. "I don't remember ya ever telling us the name"  
My breath hitched in my throat. Damn it, I was hoping nobody would ask that question. Guess I underestimated how sharp some of the people here could be.  
"Promise you won't freak out" I asked him, only to realise that was the worst thing to ask of him. It sounded really dodgy from the get-go, and if his raised eyebrow was anything to go by, then I was correct in that he didn't trust it at all. He didn't say a thing and neither did I, in the hopes that he would eventually agree to my terms.  
Eventually he rolled his eyes, and I had to stop myself from smiling at my minor victory.  
"Fine, I promise" He sighed, uncrossing his arms. He clearly wasn't really happy about making that promise, and I got the distinct feeling that he might not even be able to keep that promise. I took a deep breath in, working up the courage to say the words that haunted most people on this planet.  
"Hyperion"  
He didn't say anything for a long time, his eyes still portraying the same wary expression from before. Maybe he didn't hear me? I couldn't remember the last time I had met someone who actually was perfectly calm after I had told them who I worked for. Or who knows, maybe it just hasn't sunk in yet.  
"WHAT?!"  
Ah, it just hadn't sunk in yet for him.  
"YA WORKED FER 'Y-MPH!" I cut him off before he could start shouting the roof down in the building. I wasn't really sure how many people he had just woken up. It wish I could say that it was because I didn't want to wake the others in the hotel, but it mostly came down to the fact that I knew a witch hunt would happen against my name if they knew who I had worked for.  
After a couple of hurried hand signals, I managed to get my message across that I wanted us to go somewhere else. Luckily, he understood pretty quickly and we made our way over to the dining room.  
"You worked fer 'yperion?!" Jack finally managed to get that sentence out, and with his calmer state it didn't seem likely that he was going to shout my ears off this time.  
"Yeah, I'm not really proud of that fact" I admitted sheepishly, rubbing the back of my neck. "I left once the owner of Hyperion lost his shit"  
"You mean 'andsome Jack?"  
"Yeah"  
Jack started to bite his thumb, unsure about the news I had just told him. I kicked myself mentally for thinking it looked sexy, instead choosing to focus on his worried expression to remind myself that I might actually be in trouble.  
"Alotta people 'ere in this motel 'ate that place" Jack said, looking over at the closed doors of the others.  
"I can completely understand why"  
"And ye just got most people 'ere to trust ya"  
"Depends on your opinion on what trust is, but I guess"  
"Are ya planning to tell the others?" Jack asked me, his eyes showing his apprehension. He still was biting his thumb lightly, and I had to stop myself from staring.  
"If they ask me, I will tell them the truth" I admitted, sighing softly. "But I wasn't sure it was wise to just tell them out of the blue"  
"To be 'onest, it probably will be better the earlier you tell them" Jack advised me, finally removing the thumb from his mouth. "If they learn after a couple a months, they're gonna be pissed as all 'ell"  
"Yeah, that makes sense"  
"I suppose that explains why ye are 'ere in 'ollow point" Jack said, pieces of the puzzle making more sense to him now. "Ya don't wanna be tracked by those fuckers"  
"Exactly"  
He nodded his head, probably while still being in thought. Unlike what I thought, he actually seemed to be trusting me more now that he understood my motivations better. I couldn't really understand why, as most people start trusting me less the more things they discover. I wonder why Jack was an exception to that rule.  
A clang sounded on the floor once more, Jack swearing again as he picked up the same gun from before. I guess sticking it in the back of his pants is a old habit, one that he seemed to have difficulty letting go.  
"Alright, fine" Jack gave up, sighing as he tried to not notice my gleeful smile. "Let's go get a gun 'olster"  
"Yeah boy"

* * *

 

 

  
Finding a bandit was really easy once we actually got going, actually finding a random guy the moment we turned the corner into an alleyway. He was quite agitated from what I could see, and after one or two slurred insults to us I decided that he'd probably be fine with us taking his holsters from him. I could tell Jack wasn't too impressed still, but he let me do my work without really interfering.  
The guy had two holsters on him, one being a pistol holster and the other being a shotgun holster. While I had been hoping to just stick a pistol holster on Jack (As they were way easier to hide), but it soon became apparent that the gun was far too big for the small pistol holster. While Jack clipped his onto his hips, I wrapped the spare pistol holster around my chest. It would work well to hide a pistol behind a cloak, once I got a proper working pistol to actually use.  
" 'ow in the jesus fecking christ am I supposed to 'ide this 'olster?" Jack grumbled behind me, which made me turn around to see that he was annoyed at the large size of the holster and gun. He likely was used to being able to hide the thing so that he didn't draw any attention to himself. It was a fair point, but it was likely also the reason why people didn't seem to leave these guys alone.  
"If you don't have a cloak, then you're just gonna have to intimidate people with it instead" I answered, fixing the belt he had attached it to, hoping to prevent it completely slipping off his hips. He did have quite skinny hips for a guy after all. "It's a good way to ensure that you don't have to use it that much. No need to fire a gun if someone is scared to confront you"  
He grumbled, but didn't really say anything in response to that. He stayed still and let me fix his belt, which would make sure his pants stopped drooping with the gun attached. Wouldn't want to frighten delicate people with a shot of his own body hair down below.  
"How does it feel?"  
"It feels like I 'ave a four year old 'anging onto my pants"  
I laughed at the weird analogy, taking a couple of steps backwards to inspect my handiwork. I couldn't help but feel happy that I could notice him smiling a little at the fact I laughed, but I tried my hardest to concentrate. I inspected a bit too well, noticing that I hadn't actually done my job as well as I had hoped.  
"Dude, you realise that people can see your pubes, right?" I coughed out, putting my hand in a certain position to block out the sight of his crotch. He looked down hurriedly, seeing what I was talking about. He started to fix his pants, leaving me to my own thoughts.  
My stupid still horny heat riddled mind must have not taken enough suppressants, as my eyes started to wonder over him as he fixed his belt. His clothing was actually quite well considering for where they lived, him wearing a dark red shirt that actually seemed to fit him well. It fit him a little too well, as it gave me and possibly anyone else a nice show with his nice shoulder muscles as well as decent bicep buildup on his arms.  
He wasn't the buffest of guys I had ever seen, but the way his body seemed to work told me that he might have been really well built at one point in his life. He had let himself go a little bit, but he still looked like he could handle himself well enough.   
"Seein' as we are out and about anyway" Jack said, satisfied with the condition of his clothing. "D'ya think ya can teach me to shoot better?"  
"Sure thing" I answered readily, taking any chance for the both of us to get better along. Not to mention it wouldn't actually hurt that bad to have a guy who knows how to watch himself at my side for a while. "Do you know a spot where we can practice?"  
He put a single finger to his lips in thought, before seemingly making up his mind about which place was the safest/best place for us to train. Despite the fact I was under the impression that he really didn't like me, he grasped my hand softly and led me down one of the alleyways. I was honestly quite impressed with how these guys never got lost in this place despite everything looking the same. Then again, I guess that is how a lot of people would have seen me at my old work.  
"We aren't heading to the ‘Purple Skag’ are we?" I quickly double-checked with him, not really wanting to encounter that drunk bar owner again.  
"Nah, just somewhere nearby there" He answered me, taking us around a sharp left in the road. "It's a little shooting range that's just used by drunkards or ignored most of the time. It's where I usually go to train, so it should be fine"  
We suddenly came to an abrupt halt down one of the alleys, Jack obviously taking note of something on one of the walls. Something he didn't like, as his face was twisted into an ugly scowl. When I followed his gaze, I noticed it was a wanted poster on the wall again, one that looked way too similar to the one I had ripped apart the previous day. Mark, being held up by someone as he was unconscious, his face beaten and bloody.  
"Mother fucker" Jack swore to himself, letting go of my hand for a moment just to tear down the poster angrily. "I wish the bastard never existed"  
"I know what you mean" I grumbled, angry myself at the way Mark seemed to be treated by whoever that was. I guessed roughly that the bandit boss who had treated him bad was probably the same one that was posting the stupid wanted ads all over the place.   
I didn't even need to explain my reasoning behind why I was mad at the guy, Jack seemed to make his own deductions from the fact there already was a ripped up poster that wasn't a part of his one. I guess he figured out quickly that it must have been me, as he nodded his approval to me.  
He didn't really say much else, taking my hand again softly before setting off again. We remained in silence until we reached the place he must have been talking about. It was a mock shooting range and quite a bad one at that, as most if not all of the targets were completely decimated.  
"That target looks buggered" I told him frankly, which made him laugh. If I had to guess, it was probably my use of words that did the trick. Either way, mission accomplished.  
"Yeah, I use the old bottles littered 'round the place instead" Jack informed me, having to calm himself down a little bit unless he wanted bandits to come around and see what the heck was making all that noise.  
"Just make sure you don't get glass in your eyes" I mockingly told him, hoping to keep on going with my success rate at making him laugh. It had worked, as he started laughing again despite his attempts at stopping.  
"Yes mum" He joked, rolling his eyes while giving me the weirdest tone he could manage. It was so stupid that I didn't even have to fake laughter along with him.  
We both laughed, a moment of light heartedness washing over the both of us. I gave him a very gentle playful shove, which he returned in kind. For a moment, it was just the two of us looking like idiots, constantly shoving the other while giggling like children. It felt like a silly moment, but I cherished it nonetheless.  
Once we managed to stop and had stopped giggling like schoolgirls respectively, Jack got to work at preparing his gun. It took him a bit to pull back the heavy chamber, but he didn’t seem to need my help in slotting in the single round. He let the entire chamber go when he was happy with the bullet, allowing the entire thing to snap back with a loud _thunk._  
"Any tips?"  
"Use both hands, don't lock your elbows, pull the trigger smoothly, and don't forget to-  
"Woah now! I don't need that many!" Jack said while chuckling and making a silly face. "Besides, I think I've 'eard that before"  
He raised the gun towards one of the leftover bottles on the stand, but his hands were visibly shaking as he tried to look down the sights. It shook so much that he didn't seem confident enough to even take a test shot with it.  
"Is it heavy?"  
"Is my 'air green?"  
"I'll take that as a yes" I laughed, rolling my eyes lightly before sliding a little into place behind him. "Here, let me support your arms for you"  
Despite me warning him beforehand that I was going to support them, he still visibly flinched as I moved my hands over his. In the end, it was mostly just our hands and his back/my chest that were connecting, so he seemed to relax pretty quickly. But I just couldn't help but tease him about the fact that he purposely clicked the safety on and off the gun before being satisfied.  
"I see you've learned from being around me" I teased him, wanting to poke him in the ribs while I was at it. I decided not to, as suddenly leaving him with the heavy weapon didn't sound good.  
"Shut up, leave me alone" Jack giggled, his entire back almost making me laugh with how it vibrated against my chest.  
He pulled the trigger smoothly, the gun firing the bullet directly into the neck of the bottle. The glass shattered brilliantly in a shower of glittery shards, clinking softly against the ground before we both decided we weren’t going to get assualted by any flying shards. Like I had assumed, the gun had a heavy recoil from the shot, but he seemed to handle it better once he was actually in control of the gun. Unlike his haphazard aiming from before, his aiming was directly spot on.  
"Nice work Casanova" I praised him, being genuinely impressed with how he handled the gun. Most people couldn’t even account for the large barrel, but he seemed to take it all in his stride as if he was used to guns all his life. I guess that’s why he was trusted with the gun in the motel.  
He was obviously quite pleased with my praise, as I could spy the sides of his lips widen considerably into what I could only assume to be an ear splitting grin. He turned his head around, probably to ask me a question or to boast, but I could tell that he must have miscalculated the distance between us as his lips banged into mine clumsily.  
I'm not even sure it counted as a kiss, more like a ghost of one. But I could still feel the prickly sensation of his mustache and beard against my smooth skin. I could spy his cheeks light up with a very light tint of red, and with how hot my cheeks felt, they probably were doing the same.  
He eventually decided to move, bringing his lips away from mine and coughing awkwardly.  
"Sorry about that” He apologised, allowing me to let go of his arms and shuffle backwards out of his bubble. “I uh... I don’t know what ‘appened just now...”  
“It’s fine, just an accident” I tried to laugh off my nerves, giggling a little awkwardly to try and ignore my rampant emotions. “I mean, it’s not like I hated it”  
And of course I just had to ruin it. Fantastic job Ally.  
I honestly expected him to pull an annoyed face at me, but I noticed that he was staring down at his feet. He placed the heavy gun down with a loud _clunk_ on the counter of the gun range, before looking at me with a small shy smile on his face.  
“...Ye liked it?” He asked me softly, his voice oddly soft despite how usually loud he had been in the past.  
“Yeah, I liked it” I mumbled softly, finding it difficult to really look him in the eye. “I know I’m a stranger to you guys, but you’ve all been so nice to me and well...”  
“Probably doesn’t ‘urt that I’m ‘ot as balls, eh?” He joked with me, making me laugh loud enough that he grinned cheekily at me. I guess it must have been what he was going for, making me relax in the slightly awkward atmosphere. “I probably gave ye the impression that I didn’t like ye, but... I gotta be ‘onest, I’m interested in you”  
I had to admit, despite being an Alpha (The class that usually was the most brazen and confident out of all three), I had never actually encountered someone admitting that they were interested in me. My surprise must have shown on my face, as he couldn’t help but let out a chuckle.  
" ‘ave I got ya stunned?"  
"That's a way to describe it, yes"  
He chuckled again, looking deep into my eyes. Part of me wanted to avert my eyes, but his intense gaze kept me locked onto him.  
"That's alright" Jack assured me, smiling softly to ease my nerves. "I'm fine with waiting for ya, take yer time to find out what ya want"  
"Thank you”


	11. Sweat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heavy suggestive themes ahead

Unsurprisingly, going for a number of days without showering and literally carrying people/objects around didn't do well for hygiene. What bummed me out more than that was actually the fact I would have to figure out where the damn towels were in the motel.  
"Agh! Come on!"  
As I was considering just letting myself air dry once I was done, I heard Phil grumble in annoyance ahead of me. He obviously was tinkering with something in a closet, the majority of his body being ducked into it to bang on something that sounded like metal. When he did finally bring his head out of the closet for a moment to grab some tool on the ground, we both quickly noticed each other down the hall.  
"Sup Phil" I decided to greet him, to which he quickly waved a hand in a greeting.  
"What's up?" asked Phil, his hands still fiddling with something in that closet. It was obvious from his tone that he was concentrating his hardest on actually fixing whatever it was that he was working on, as his tone sounded understandably distracted rather than happy and cheerful in the past.  
"I was actually going to ask you if you knew where the towels were" I answered, leaning against the wall near to him. I hadn't expected that question to really make his full attention come over to me, but it seemed to work. He gave up on what he was working on, motioning me to come over and take a look at whatever it was that he was working on.  
I did as he asked, moving far enough past the door to notice that it looked like an old water cylinder that had been upgraded with some spare electronic parts around the place. A bright red electronic display was stuck in the middle of it all, with the numbers twenty eight blaring at the both of us.  
"As you can see, you'll have a bit of difficulty taking a shower now" Phil told me, smacking the water heater lightly in annoyance. The water cylinder naturally didn't do anything with the smack it was given, and he let out a groan of annoyance. "We probably used it all up with hot water for food"  
I grumbled, placing my hands on my hips. My heat was going to finish in one or two days, and I didn't want to regain my sense of smell just to only be able to smell my stench.  
In the end, we both were a little bit grumpy with either fact being presented to us. Phil seemed to try and lessen his upset mood with some deep breaths, and then putting a smile on his face. Even though I hadn't thought it possible for him to be honestly smiling, he was. It even showed clearly in his eyes, them both sparkling brightly with happy emotions.  
"Sorry, I guess it sounds like I am complaining about a whole lot, huh?" He apologised, and I tried to wave my hand in such a way to show him that I wasn't really mad at him for such a thing. "This place is actually really good, but occasionally some things will still drive me bonkers. Is there actually anything I can do for you?"  
"Well, I still really need to take a shower or something like that" I explained to him, lifting my arm and sniffing the appendage to show an example of what I meant. "Is there any other way to actually wash myself?"  
He seemed to actually know a way, as he looked a little bit sheepish when I stared at him. Over time, my gaze or his own mind seemed to betray him, as I could spy a gentle tint of red start to colour his cheeks.  
"Well, there is a way, but... I mean, it's usually one that two guys can do at once" Phil tried to explain, clearing his throat loudly to maybe take the attention away from his cheeks. "We have a tub that should be big enough for two people, and we could heat it up with boiling water and normal water but..."  
'But the two of us would be naked together' seemed to be the thing that he was avoiding to say. It was clear from his tone and mannerisms that he had planned to take a bath too, and he hadn't planned for both the water cylinder to be broken or for someone else to try and join him.  
"Ahem, so uh... yeah" He stammered, his cheeks completely giving up on being at all subtle. "I mean, I guess I can wait myself"  
"But don't you need to take one? No offense, but your hair looks about as greasy as mine feels" I reminded him, and he gently felt one of his longer locks to double check my words. And it was true, he pulled a disgusted face at the feeling between his fingers. "...Could we maybe wear swimsuits while taking it? It would probably feel like some funny spa day instead if we do that"  
"Probably would be a better idea than anything else" He agreed, the usual happy smile appearing once more. "I'll go get yours and then prepare the bath for us"  
________________________________________

  
Luckily for me, the swimsuit he had given me was my size. However, as I started to twist the straps around the correct way, I suddenly realised how badly this could go. 'Let's make it a funny spa day' my ass. God, how could I be so stupid with an idea?  
This was gonna go badly.  
Despite those thoughts swirling in my mind, I knew that I couldn't really avoid it forever. I had told him that I was content to take a bath with him as long as we wore swimsuits, so it was likely too late to change my mind on it. I gave myself a gentle slap on the cheek to make sure I wouldn't change my mind, and tiptoed my way down to bathroom. Nobody noticed me, and I was really grateful for it as I really didn't want to have to explain the situation to any of the other guys in the hotel. Dan would likely kill me on the spot if I even remotely mentioned it.  
...Why am I so concerned about what Dan would think? When I entered the bathroom, Phil was busy pouring the hot water from the kettle into the washbasin, a warm steam wafting up from the surface of the water.  
I threw the confusing question out of my mind as I entered the bathroom, raising my eyes from the floor to see that Phil was kneeling over a washbasin, checking the temperature of the water placed inside it, a gentle steam wafting up from the surface. It clearly was a warm one, one that my muscles almost immediately liked the idea of. It didn't take long for him to notice me, casting a quick glance at the swimsuit I was wearing with a nervous smile.  
"It seems to fit you pretty well" He laughed softly to himself, soon looking away once he got a bit embarrassed. "Would you believe that it used to belong to Connor?"  
"I can actually imagine that, it seems to be a bit tighter around the hips than most female swimsuits" I replied to him, mostly to try and lift the awkward atmosphere. I almost immediately regretted saying those words, as Phil cast a quick glance at my hips to see what I was referring to. He looked away with a slight tinge of red on his cheeks when he saw that I was correct.  
It didn't help that when Phil stood up, I could see that he wasn't wearing all that much. He was only wearing a pair of swimming trunks in the shape of boxers, his upper half having nothing to cover it. I could spy some funny marks on his chest, a little below his actual nipples that seemed to have a funny colour to it. Something purple? Either way, he seemed to get a bit self conscious with my gaze, covering up his chest with a sheepish laugh. It might not have been obvious to all people, but I noticed that he was actually covering up those purple marks than his nipples.  
"Ahem, the basin doesn't look very big" I coughed a little to distract both myself and him, coming up with anything to talk about.  
"Yeah... it's actually supposed to be for one person" Phil commented softly, to which I nearly slapped myself in the fact. Great job Ally, you just made it more awkward than it was before.  
He saw my grimace, and just decided to laugh softly as he eased himself into the basin first. It clearly was warmer than he expected as he took his time before he sat down with his knees crossed. I mentally kicked myself one more time before I followed him in, trying to sit just like he was to give him some space. He still covered his chest, and I didn't blame him for it, so I just decided to keep my eyes to myself.  
Both the fact that Phil had really long legs and the fact the basin was tiny, made it so that my crossed over knees ended up being on top of his knees. I awkwardly tried to change my position so that I wouldn't be in that close contact with him, only realising that my legs were now in a more awkward position, sticking out over his knees even more than before.  
"My bad" I mumbled, deciding to just take some of the water and spill it over my legs to keep them warm. It wasn't really working, and I think Phil noticed it quite quickly.  
"Hold on, let me try something" Phil asked me, beginning to shift his own knees in an awkward way, probably to make more space for me. However, I could feel him start to slip a little from the soap and water, but he realised too late. "I think I can-AHH!"  
When he had tried to shift, he had slipped fully on the water and soap, grabbing onto the nearest thing for support, which happened to be my shoulders. As the basin, water and the two of us splashed and got tangled in each other, one particularly big wave splashed me in the face and I insctintively shut my eyes to try and protect them. The best thing I could do was keep my hands placed firmly against his own shoulders.  
We splashed unceremoniously around for a bit before Phil seemed to find his balance, and we stopped tumbling around. Once we had stopped tumbling around, I called out to him.  
"Hey Phil, you okay?"  
"Yeah, I think I'm okay" Phil responded back to me, sounding like he was slightly in pain. "I got some soap in my eyes though"  
I lifted my hands away from his shoulders to rub my eyes, hopefully to get any sort of soap or water away before I did anything further. Once I was satisfied, I slowly opened my eyes.  
Phil had ended up tumbling onto his back, his legs dangling out of the wash basin while his head was half submerged in the water. He was busy rubbing his eyes to get out the soap, making small pain filled whimpers.  
What took a while for me to understand, and what he likely hadn't realised yet, was that we had landed in a very... compromising position.  
Somehow, I had landed on his lap with my hips digging into his own hip bones. After I had rubbed my eyes I had put them back where they were earlier, which was still his shoulders. All in all, I was suddenly acutely aware of how little I was wearing, how little he was wearing and the fact I was literally straddling a guy in a washbasin.  
I didn't dare move as he rubbed his eyes further, worried about possibly making us slip and tumble again if I moved without warning him, but I also wasn't too keen on telling him we were in the position we were.  
Unfortunately for me, his eyes were soon cleared enough to open them and look up at me. He realised our position a lot quicker than I had, even recoiling slightly at the sight of me looming over him. He didn't say anything, just sort of looked down and up us both to see what had happened, the same red tinge reappearing with a lot more colour than before.  
"Are your eyes okay now?" I asked him, hoping to elicit some sort of normal response from him. I was kind of hoping my words would snap him out of it, and that he'd apologise and fix the situation.  
However, he didn't do either of those. It was like he had lost his ability to speak, only really able to swallow nervously before laughing awkwardly at the situation.  
I sighed a little at how he didn't do anything and rolled my eyes at the same time. Despite his lack of words, I clearly got the hint that I was overstepping his boundaries.  
"Sorry about that" I apologised, tensing the muscles in my arms to push off his shoulders. "I'll get off you now"  
The movement naturally caused friction between our hips, Phil letting out a small gasp of surprise before he grabbed my arms to stop me from moving. I looked over at him, wondering why on Pandora he had stopped me. I knew it was kind of awkward, but he would be better off once I was actually off him.  
I got an indication of why when I felt a bulge had formed in his swim shorts. His eyes were half lidded, his mouth slightly open while panting softly.  
"Phil?"  
I felt his hips shift under me, but I wasn't sure if it was on purpose or not. His breath hitched in his throat, moving one of his hands to cover his mouth with the back of it.  
The movements and sights were taking a toll on me, my nose sparking back into action. I was then taking in wafts of apple sauce with caramel, it sending me into a lust filled daze. He smelled so incredibly good...  
He was making small whimpering noises, his eyes focused intensely on me. They almost seemed to be daring me to do something, but I might have been misinterpreting due to my heat.  
I wondered quickly in my mind what I was supposed to do in the situation. Kiss him? Grind my hips?  
I was a complete newbie to this sort of thing, but most people didn't guess that due to my class. Before I even could ask him what I was supposed to do, the door to the bathroom opened.  
Shit, I guess I forgot to lock it. Did that door even have a lock in the first place?  
"Hey Phil, Tyler says that din-WHAT IN THE HELL??!!"  
My head twisted sharply to see Dan holding the door for dear life while looking at us in what seemed to be horror. Oh god, of all the people it could have been, it had to be him.  
He looked like he wasn't sure how he was supposed to take the situation. I didn't blame him really, I had the same clueless look on my face probably.  
Phil placed both of his hands behind his back, trying to quickly sit up and probably stammer out some weird explanation to his friend. He didn't get very far at all, his movements causing even more contact, enough for him to moan. A little too audibly, as both Dan and me turned our confused/horrified looks to him. All Phil could do further was cover his face in embarrassment, the red parts of his face clearly visible to us both.  
"Okay, I'm gonna go now" Dan broke the silence, pointing down the hall as if to indicate where he was going. "I'm gonna come back when less weird shit is going on..."  
Dan took off down the hall, the only real noise we could hear was his running feet across the floor down the hallway. Once it was clear Dan was gone, I could hear Phil groan in shame through his hands, refusing to remove them at all.  
"Noo, Dan saw us..." I could hear Phil's muffled wails through his hands still. "Oh god, what am I gonna do? I'll be the laughing stock of everyone in the motel"  
So apparently it was more embarrassing to have been found in that situation more than being in that position was. I tried my hardest not to laugh at him, instead doing my best to console him.  
"Come on, you don't seriously think Dan will do that" I explained to him, gently removing the hands in front of Phil's face. His face was still really red, but his eyes looked a little hopeful. "He's your best friend, right? I'm sure you guys can talk about this and sort out any misunderstanding"  
Phil nodded his head, agreeing with me on the subject. He probably already knew that, but I guess he just needed to be reminded of that. The two of them always seemed close after all.  
I had managed to remove myself from Phil's hips without any further issues, mostly because I had taken the opportunity to get off while he was distracted. My god, why didn't I just do that in the first place?  
"Sorry about that just now" I stammered awkwardly, rubbing the back of my neck. "That was kinda my fault"  
"No, I think it was probably my fault" Phil tried to reassure me, finding his words again. "I certainly didn't help anyway"  
The both of us sort of left it at that, not mentioning the subject afterwards. We had both decided that we had gotten clean enough that we had our baths at that, and wished each other a goodnight.  
Geez, what am I doing? Hugging one guy while sitting on his lap, getting kissed by another and then having a grind bath fest with one more. Ally, you big idiot.

 


	12. Open your eyes

My cape billowed as me and my boss left the elevator leading to the main part of Helios, The hub of heroism. Who made up the name, I had no clue.  
Everything seemed to be functioning as it always had, loader bots moving crates filled with materials, people clicking away impatiently on their keyboards around the entire floor. The only thing that was out of place was the usual claptrap that was running rampant, angering my boss.  
He gave it a slight kick to the eye when it came nearby to him, earning a small wail from the robot. It fell over, complaining something about extreme pain.  
"Why do those things behave so stupidly? I swear, they annoy me more than the crazy scientists in this place" He grumbled, crossing his arms as he walked on past it.  
"Don't forget, you made them" I reminded him, placing the claptrap back upright before continuing to follow him like a shadow. I didn't agree with him on that subject, as I had certainly had worse interactions with the scientists in this place rather than the claptrap's.  
He didn't turn back to look at me, but I could tell from his mannerisms that he was grinning to himself. He knew the fact quite well, but seemed to enjoy their stupidity at the same time. It gave him an excuse to let out his anger against them.  
Lately, the stress had been getting to him quite strongly and he often let out his frustration in small doses against the robots if they got close enough. Luckily, that seemed to be enough to let off steam.  
I could often tell when he would snap from his kind self to his more violent half, usually when something would drastically go wrong with the company. The longer I spent around him, the more the violent side started to appear as a common fixture than the kind side I had always known. He might have never taken it out on me or anyone he respected, but people could honestly irritate him so easily some days.  
Speaking of which, one example was bustling her way over to him as I had thought of it.  
"Hello sir! Would you like a coffee?" One of our female employee's said, her button shirts obviously undone to show off her cleavage. Her nails were painted a bright yellow, likely hoping to please my boss as it was his favourite colour. I would have even told her about how her hair was unprofessional, all falling out of her bun, but I knew it likely wouldn't stick with her. She probably didn't even see me standing next to him, giving her a disapproving look. "I made it myself"  
She held out a cup of coffee that looked like it had been made by a machine into a takeaway cup, the only real difference being that she had added some milk to it. He looked like he wanted to ignore her, but he likely knew that ignoring her would just not get the message across that he really didn't want it. In the end, he tried his best to not roll his eyes or be rude to her as he talked to her.  
"Sorry tuts, I just had a big lunch" He said, waving her off with his hand before slipping around her without another word. Her smile completely dropped once she saw that he wasn't looking at her, sadly trudging herself back to wherever she worked. Even as I walked away, I couldn't help but notice that a slight scowl had broken through my normal stoic face.  
Why did girls keep trying to flirt with him? It was common knowledge in the company that he had a girlfriend. Heck, even some stupid boys in the company would try the same. Just like that weird scientist that tried to hump his leg that one time.  
"Oh my god, how many does that make?" He asked me, sighing while rubbing his metallic face mask in annoyance. I tried my best to fix the scowl of my face, returning to my normal face around the other employee's.  
"It would be 13" I brought up the number, sighing myself with the sheer number.  
"Today or this week?"  
"Today"  
"Ugh"  
We dropped the subject, clearly not finding anything more interesting to bring up about it. It was an uncomfortable subject for me at least, and he seemed to respect that. As we neared the main elevator on the floor, a familiar beeping sound rang out from his belt. He picked up his pager, looking at the screen to see what the message was.  
"Son of a taint" He muttered, repeating his unique form of swearing as he grumbled. I had to stop myself from laughing at the swear, instead trying to look over his taller shoulder at the request. He saw me looking, and already decided to tell me about it without me even having to ask him about it. "It's those idiots on level five hundred and seventeen again. Something about a robot scaring employees"  
"Honestly, they're so scared of everything that I likely would believe them requesting us because of a mouse" I grumbled, opening the door to the elevator. He stepped in at the same time as he stuck the pager back down onto his belt, turning around in the chamber to look back at me. "How many times do they keep calling us? 8 times a week was their previous record"  
"I dunno" He responded, scratching a part of his head in boredom at the idea. "This week it's only been 4 times, I think"  
"Want me to go and check it out instead?" I suggested to him, already seeing his shoulders relax a little at the idea. It wasn't much, but if I could take a little bit of annoyance away from his day then I would gladly take that chance. I felt my hands pat my twin shock pistols at my side, which just seemed to make him laugh. We both knew that I wouldn't need them, but it was a funny idea to scare some of the skittish ones on that level.  
He grinned at me once he was done laughing, his eyes giving off a happy and caring feel to them. I could smell his scent going a bit haywire, probably due to the Omega having their heat this week. It still smelt the same to me, like pepper and vanilla.  
"I'd love it if you could" He said, giving me a gentle smile to show his thanks. "I know I can trust you to handle those morons and anything weird going on"  
"You know it" I said, flashing a quick smile and wink to him.  
As the elevator he stood in started to boot up and begin working, he flashed me the same smile and wink in return, accompanied by a fist bump against the glass that stood between us. I quickly placed my fist in the same place, the two of us smiling towards each other before the elevator whisked him away to another floor. Despite now being on my own, I turned around with the confidence I always had in this place.  
"Now, let's hurry up and handle that problem down on level 517"  
________________________________________

My eyes sprung open, seeing the same wooden ceiling that I had seen for the last couple of days. I almost wanted to just curl up into the soft fur blankets and go back into that dream I just had, remembering all the good times from the past. It was so real, the warm smile and happy times...  
But I knew that couldn't be anymore. Any shred of kindness and common decency was gone in him, a close relationship only reserved for possibly just me now.  
So, why? Why was I so sad when I would think of him now? Was it because of the fact he was so kind to everyone so long ago?...  
A crashing noise drew me from my thoughts, making me sit up in my bed in anticipation and fright. Everyone should be asleep right now. Then again, that's likely what everyone thought a couple nights ago when I tried to sneak out of here, and I broke a glass and nearly burnt down the place on that night.  
Either way, my paranoia won out, making me get out of the warm comfort of the bed. I got dressed as best as I could in the dark, before sneaking out into the hallway to see if I could find what made the noise. If someone had broken in, then I needed to find out what was wrong.  
My door opened smoothly, the darkness seeming endless down the corridor. I thought for a moment that the noise wouldn't repeat itself, but I soon heard a couple of footsteps in the bathroom nearby. Strange, maybe someone was sick from dinner yesterday? I didn't think it was likely, seeing as Tyler had made it and he seemed to be the best chef out of the group of boys here.  
Regardless of whether it was that someone was sick, I didn't want to leave them to their suffering.  
As I neared the still open bathroom door, I noticed a shadow amble around in the dark. Whoever it was seemed to trying to find something, their irritated voice telling me this as well.  
"Where the heck are they?!" They whispered in a annoyed tone, searching in what I assumed to be a medicine cabinet above the toilet. Whoever it was hadn't noticed I was there, so I gently tiptoed into the room and shut the door behind me. They still didn't hear me, so I gently spoke to them in the hopes that I wouldn't scare them.  
"Hey, are you alright?" I gently asked them, my voice barely a whisper over the noise that they were making.  
Despite me trying my hardest to truly not scare them, they did seem to get an extreme fright from me. Whoever it was seemed to whirl around in fright at my voice, before they got their foot caught on the toilet and fell over it while shouting some obscenity.   
Once they were done tumbling around, they clutched their face in pain more than anything else. They had somehow managed to land on their back on the floor, with a single leg hanging over the bowl of the toilet itself.  
"...Do you want me to turn the lights on?" I slowly asked, unsure how on Pandora I was supposed to react to their tumble. I briefly considered trying to pass it off like a joke, until I heard their frantic tone.  
"NO! No, don't do that! You'll make it worse!" They very nearly shouted at me, waving their available hand around wildly to catch my attention. I was really relieved that I had shut the door to this bathroom, as whoever it was was loud enough that they likely would have woken up someone by this point if I hadn't.  
While I was now really curious as to what 'it' was, I resisted my curiosity to ask them about it or make some sort of light in the room. I tiptoed forward closing to the groaning figure, taking a closer look at their face now that I could see them a little better in the dark.  
It was Dan who had taken the tumble, his usual stoic actions contradicting the fact he had suddenly become a really bad ballerina. I almost sighed in annoyance at the fact it was him, cursing my luck internally. The one guy who still seemed to have a dislike for me, the one who had stumbled onto me literally grinding on his best friend and... oddly, the one that I had really wanted to like me for some reason.  
I didn't know why I wanted him to like me, but I just knew that I did. He was so icy all the time that I was certain that there had to be some sort of warm part of him that was like a secret garden to explore. It also didn't help that he was... well, frankly he was very attractive to me. Mark and Jack had muscles and strength that frankly were very nice to look at, PJ and Chris both were quirky and very funny, Phil was endlessly positive and helpful, Tyler, Troye and Connor also caught my eye but I let them go due to learning they weren't attracted to my gender so... why was I so caught on the one that seemed to be the one that didn't like me?  
"Are you okay?" I asked him softly, hearing a soft yet still sort of irritated sigh at the question. I guess that was enough for me to tell that the answer was a resounding 'not really'. Despite our history not being the best, with him hating me and me staring at him often, I still offered my hand out to him in a silent offer to help him up. I expected an angry retort along with him refusing to take my hand, but to my surprise he did the exact opposite. He slowly reached his hand out to grasp my outstretched hand with a surprisingly gentle grip, mostly letting me do the work as I pulled him up from the floor. I almost missed the practically silent mutter of thanks that he gave, but I managed to catch it.  
"I was looking for my eye drops" Dan told me quickly, effectively cutting me off before I could ask him the obvious question of why he was stumbling around in the dark. An even closer look told me that he was holding his right hand over his right eye, cupping the digits around it in pain.  
"I don't think you'll be able to find them with one eye in the dark" I told him, seeing the only visible eye that he had roll at that remark. I put a hand gently on his shoulder, already feeling him jump at the contact. I half expected him to take another tumble, which made me want to hold him steady, but I decided against it when I considered how uncomfortable he might feel with that. "...Do you want me to help you find them?"  
I expected his icy attitude to return, to tell me off for touching him without asking him and to give literally any other reason for why he didn't need my help. But his features softened considerably, a gentle sigh escaping from his nose.  
"...Okay" He eventually gave me his consent, gently moving my hand away from his shoulder before he moved to sit on the toilet seat patiently. "It'll be somewhere in the cabinet, just look for the thing called Bepotastine"  
I nodded before gently leaning over him to reach into the cabinet. With the way I was leaning upwards, I could swear that I almost felt his warm breath spill over the exposed skin for a second. Sadly for me, the medicine stocked in the little cupboard was more than I had anticipated, so many bottles and vials perched in it. I experimentally picked one up, before putting it back with a bit of a frown. It was way past it's expiry date.  
"It's probably under the paracetamol" Dan spoke up for a second once he didn't hear me rummaging around for it, but I followed his instructions to a small little bottle with a eye dropper attached to the lid. I guess it should have been obvious.  
I felt the glass gently make a tink noise against my nails as I picked it up, swirling the clear liquid inside it. A small label on the side told me that it was a mixture generally used to alleviate symptoms of allergy. Huh.  
"How many drops do you need?" I asked him, twisting off the dropper and using it pick up the liquid in it.  
"Just one if it clears up quickly" He mentioned, already tilting his head back in preparation for the drops. I hadn't meant to actually offer to do them myself, but I found quite easily that I actually wasn't too bothered by the idea. I tried the dropper just over the bottle itself, barely hearing the plip of the liquid splash back inside it, before deciding it was good enough.  
"Alright, you ready?" I asked him, hearing him softly sigh through his nose once more.  
"Not really, but I guess it'll have to do" He grumbled, but hesitantly moved the hand away from his face.  
When he finally opened his eye to look up at me, I was thrown for a loop at what was before me. The pupil and iris of his eye seemed to glow purple, while the white part of his eye had turned a pitch black. The eye seemed to bleed quite profusely, the drops starting to slide down the side of his face now that he had the eyelid fully open.  
As much as I wanted answers for what was going on, I remembered that he was likely waiting for me to drop the liquid into his eye. The dribbling blood served to finally make me hurry, picking up more liquid in the dropper before I finally dropped a single drop into the centre of the eye. The drop reacted almost violently with his eye, hissing and bubbling in a strange manner like I had dropped acid in his eyes instead.  
He unsurprisingly clutched the eye in pain, loudly hissing in pain as he curled into himself.  
"Goddammit" Dan growled softly under his breath, almost bending over enough to curl into a ball. "Ow, fuck..."  
I nearly ended up moving my hand to his shoulder in support, but then a quick reminder in my mind seemed to tell me that the last time I did that he had flinched and jumped. I decided against it, instead reaching out to a nearby towel and offering it to him. It took him a moment to even realise that I had offered it to him, but took it from my hand with a quiet mumble of gratitude. Once he pressed it to the injured eye, he let out a low and slow sigh, relief evident in every part of it.  
Once the pain had died down, he lifted his head up enough for me to see his face. While the blood had stopped flowing, there clearly was a lot of blood still smeared around the eye in a messy manner. It looked so messy that I truly wondered whether he would actually be able to open his eye without getting blood back into the eye.  
"Don't mention this to Phil" Dan softly asked me, his voice almost pleading rather than anything else. I was so sure that he would be angry at me, that it was a command and not a request, but I couldn't miss the tone in his voice when he spoke. He was almost... grateful sounding.  
"You don't think Phil deserves to know?"  
"Phil has enough to worry about in the world" Dan said, moving to stand up from the toilet. "He might come across as a innocent happy go lucky guy, but he worries about everything due to the fact he feels he has to"  
"Because he's the oldest?" I asked him, already seeing him nod his head in affirmation. He gingerly removed the now bloody towel from his eye, grimacing once he saw the amount of blood on it.  
"How's it look?" Dan asked softly, a slight sigh in his voice as he turned his head back to me. He opened the eye slowly once he realised he had my full attention and I peered closer. The bleeding had stopped flowing, but the blood was still smeared in a messy manner around the eye itself. The pupil and iris had returned to normal, but some of the white of his eye still had blotches of black in it. It gave his eye a sort of Dalmatian look.  
"It does look a lot better than it did before" I told him, and he seemed to softly sigh in relief. "There is still some blood that you could wipe away though"  
He didn't really say much in response to that, instead just getting back to his work. While he certainly was giving it his best try, he just seemed to be smearing it more around rather than soaking it up.  
"...Do you want me to try?" I offered to him, holding my hand out for the towel itself. He looked down at the hand I offered with his single eye, looking unsure about which option he wanted to do. He did eventually decide that was better, showing a small smile in appreciation.  
"Thanks" He uttered softly under his breath when I accepted the fabric of the towel, but I was distracted by the smile I could still spy on his face. I had been told in the past that the rarer it was that someone smiled at you, that when they finally did, it feels like so much more than anything else they could show.  
I moved as close to him as I could without making him uncomfortable and started to wipe the blood away. I had to apply a little more force than I would have liked, but the added pressure did wonders.  
"I think you might be better off taking a bath" I commented absentmindedly, already realising the mistake of my words when I had spoken them. Recommend a bath to the one guy who had walked in on you tumbling around on his best friend in a bath. Oh boy...  
"Sure, and have some kind of weird things happening like with you and Phil" Dan said, saying something that I had already expected from him. What threw me for a loop was the fact that he was still smiling, even the tone in his voice portraying more of a joke than him being mad.  
"...I assumed that you would have told one of us off by now" I admitted to him, seeing the smile turn to a bit of a confused look.  
"Why? You're both old enough to know what you guys are doing" Dan said with a matter of fact tone, which just confused me even further. "I ran away because I'm not exactly keen on watching my best friend grind on a girl"  
"...So, you don't hate me because I'm an Alpha?"  
"Oh... Oh god no, is that why you've been avoiding me?..." Dan asked me, his voice dropping to a whisper as he waited for my answer, which came in the form of a slow nod. He took a deep breath in like he was just now putting together the puzzle pieces of everything. "Ally, I just... crap, this sounds really stupid. We've just had some bad experiences with new people trying to join here and... I was the only one who was suspicious of them before and I just... shit..."  
It finally clicked together, the reason why he didn't really do well with me. I was a stranger in his home, one that everyone else seemed to be getting along with fine, and he was reminded of the past when someone else had been the same.  
The one difference being, that back then, his suspicion had been correct.  
"...I understand" I honestly confided in him, allowing the towel to come away from his face as I inspected my work. There was almost no trace of the blood there anymore, and when his eye opened, it proved that it too had gone back to normal. "If you had a bad experience with someone else before, it's only normal that you won't take well to someone else who is in a similar situation"  
"...Thank you so much Ally. I really appreciate hearing that" He laughed softly in relief, a small weight seemingly lifted from his shoulders. It felt good to finally clear this up with him, getting things sorted between us without any actual bad blood with one another. "But uh, you know, how does the face look?"  
"I'd say you're almost beauty pageant material" I giggled softly as his cheeks started to turn a light shade of red at my remark, and he just seemed to gently rub the back of his neck.  
"...Almost?" He seemed to try and deflect the attention on him by making a joke, but I could hear a small amount of something else in his question. Insecurity?  
"Most people probably would be put off by the icy exterior you wear, but you're honestly really sweet underneath" I had to admit to him honestly. I could spy the red in his cheeks spreading even more as I kept speaking. "But once people see the real you, they'll notice that you're perfect"  
The word perfect seemed to mean the most to him, his mouth even silently repeating the word as he looked down at the ground sheepishly. He clearly had never heard himself being compared to it, and he obviously wasn't a hundred percent sure about how he was supposed to react to it. His eyes eventually managed to drift back up to me, which drew my attention in with the way he seemed to convey a heavy emotion.  
"...Do you mind if I kiss you?" He asked me softly, which made me pause for a brief second in consideration. Was it a simple 'thank you' kind of kiss, or was he referring to something more intimate? Either way, I seemed to find it quite easy to nod my head at his request.  
He gently rolled forward on the balls of his feet, leaning slightly downwards to kiss the bridge of my nose. It... frankly, was a lot more intimate than I had been expecting a kiss from him to be, as I had honestly thought he'd go for kissing me on the forehead or cheek instead.  
Dan seemed happy with what he did, drawing himself back enough to gauge my response. I gladly showed him a smile at the kiss, which seemed to make him return it in kind.  
"...So, that's um... Thanks for helping me out" Dan mumbled and fussed a little as he began to draw himself completely back from me. He seemed to be preparing himself to go back to bed, taking the bottle of drops and towel out of my hands. "I hope you sleep well"  
"Dan, hold up just for a second" I stopped him before he could sneak away from me, my left hand securely holding his shoulder so that he couldn't turn away from me straight away. His eyes returned to looking at me, sort of confused about why I had stopped him. "Just let me know if I make you uncomfortable, alright?"  
I waited until I got a nod back at my own request, before I moved my other hand to cup his cheek. When I saw that he didn't really seem uncomfortable by either hand, I stood onto my tiptoes to gently place a kiss to his lips.  
"I hope you sleep well" I wished him a goodnight, releasing my hands from his face and shoulder, smiling as I walked by him.   
"...Yeah, you too"

 


	13. I whip my hair back and forth

I yawned, stretching my arms as I walk out of my room. I wore my normal clothes that I was so used to, only really missing my burnt up cloak.  
Connor had promised that we would go and buy another cloak somewhere today, and I was much happier in the familiar slightly figure hugging outfit that was my own. Not that I didn't appreciate Dan's clothing, but... I honestly figured he didn't want to lose his clothing if I had my own.  
I heard a door nearby open, and I turned my head to see Mark come out of his room. He had lost his glasses overnight, and his hair wasn't as neat as it had been before, almost a tussled look. But despite all these differences, he didn't actually look all that sad or tired. If anything, he just seemed more peaceful, like he had gotten a good night's sleep and was perfectly content with that.  
When he noticed me, he sent me a gentle smile. An appreciative one.  
I didn't even know if he had come to terms with what had happened to him. But he trusted some Alpha, and he was sort of able to talk about it. He was also able to cry, which was important. Men shouldn't have to hide their feelings simply because it's considered 'unmanly' by society. Screw society.  
"Good morning Mark" I greeted him, sending him a smile in return for his own. He chuckled softly when he saw it, moving closer with his arms open wide in an offer for a hug.  
"Morning" Mark returned the greeting, his tone lazy and relaxed as he gently wrapped his arms around me. "Thanks for yesterday"  
I giggled at his tired voice, moving my hands to reciprocate the hug he had given me. I gently patted his back, him letting out a hum in appreciation when I did.  
When he did let go of me, he gave a puzzled look as he gently sniffed the air.  
"Do you wear perfume?" He asked, sniffing the air just a bit more to get a better idea of what he was actually getting. "It's a nice smell... Something with wax?"  
"No, I simply stopped taking my suppressants" I answered with a slight shrug of the shoulders, twirling my hair as I did so. "I am quite certain my heat was done"  
His face flushed a shade of red, embarrassed with how the conversation turned. Complimenting someone else on how their scent smelled was usually seen as a taboo, and he clearly knew this from how his ability to form a sentence had all but gone.  
"Oh" Mark said, looking unsure how he was supposed to respond to the statement. "Well-Thats, um... Hey! Breakfast!"  
He dashed past me, heading down the stairs in an attempt to avoid the conversation. I ended up finding the display so cute, that I honestly wasn't mad in the slightest. I just chuckled, deciding to follow him in that direction.  
"Oh! Yer up" I heard Jack say to Mark at the foot of the stairs, his tone carefree compared to the almost comically stiff version that Mark responded in. "I was gonna wake ya and Ally, but ye seem awake enough"  
"Ally's already awake" Mark responded so strangely, and from what I could hear of his hurried footsteps, he seemed to dash off after he had passed on that message to Jack.  
Jack's head turned to me when I started to head down the steps, as my boots weren't exactly known for their sneaking ability after all.  
Jack looked up and down my outfit, seemingly nodding his head with how it seemed to fit.  
"Nice outfit" Jack complimented me on it, leaning against the railing to the stairs in a relaxed manner as I finally reached the bottom of the stairs.  
"Thanks" I thanked him, laughing while giving him a playful smack on the shoulder. "It's my normal outfit, I showed up here with this on"  
"Really? I guess I'll 'ave to pay more attention" Jack laughed, returning the playful smack to the shoulder.  
The both of us walked into the dining room, seeing all the rest of the ten gathered there. Unlike the usual cook Tyler; Dan and Phil were the ones cooking in the kitchen. Phil was busy trying to flip a pancake in a pan, while Dan was cleaning up around him.  
"Good morning sleeping beauty" Dan greeted me when he noticed me walking in, a slight hint of teasing in his tone. "Get enough sleep?"  
Jack looked confused between the two of us, obviously not really understanding the sudden change in tone. After all, he had last seen that Dan reluctantly allowed me to stay while I bumbled my way around him. But he soon deemed it not important enough to put that much attention into, and shrugged his shoulders before going to find a place at the table.  
I lightly jabbed Dan in the arm, and he raised his arms in mock defeat. We both laughed for a little before he got called away by a frantic Phil, who was trying his best to flip the pancakes he was in charge of. Dan just sighed as he walked away, while I decided to head over to the dining table where the rest of the group were lingering.  
"Morning Ally" Chris greeted, a warm smile on his face. "You planning on kicking people's butts today?"  
"I don't know" I answered truthfully, shrugging my shoulders. "Depends on what we are doing today"  
Chris pouted slightly, upset at the answer. Him, PJ, Dan and Phil were the only ones who didn't get to see my fighting prowess in person, and I was guessing that he wanted to see it with his own eyes.  
"I know this might sound weird" Tyler asked me, sitting up more straight in his chair once he had my attention. "But, can I style your hair?"  
"Why Tyler? Cause you ran out of people who wanted their hair to be styled?" Connor teased lightly, laughing from where he sat a couple seats down from him.  
"Shush! I am a great stylist and you all know it!" Tyler huffed in a joking manner, crossing his arms childishly over his chest. Many other members of the motel laughed at his antics, and he too began to smile once he saw that he had managed to make people laugh. "Besides, I haven't styled long hair"  
I looked over everyone, seeing that everyone except for PJ and Chris had their hair styled in a specific or fancy way. I had to admit, the hair styles complemented each man quite well. And true to what Tyler said, none of them really had 'long' hair that he could style in different manners.  
"Why not" I concluded, making Tyler happy and giddy with the prospective idea.  
"Coming through!" Both Dan and Phil called loudly, the both of them bumbling their way past their friends, carrying way too many plates on each arm than was really safe. Despite this, they both managed to place the plates down on the table without dropping food or any plates in the process. The both of seemed to find this better than anything in the world at that moment, excitedly giving each other a high five.  
"Can't you guys just take the plates two at a time like a normal person?" Troye asked, giving a heavily exaggerated sigh to go with it.  
"That's for wusses" Dan said triumphantly to him, his hands planted firmly on his hips in a confident manner. "Now eat. We didn't make these just so you guys could let them get cold"  
Phil laughed at his best friends antics, before he noticed me looking over at them both. While Dan was still distracted with telling people to eat their food, he leaned closer to me with a sly smile obvious planted on his face.  
"Haven't you heard the saying?" He asked me cheekily, trying to subtly point at Dan next to him. It wasn't as subtle as he thought he was being, as Dan turned his head with a sceptical look towards him. "Kiss the cook"  
"PHIL LESTER!" Dan interrupted the both of us, yanking Phil away from me into a nearby seat. He clearly must have heard what Phil had said, the most obvious hint being that there was a steady blush beginning to creep over his cheeks. Nobody else had heard Phil however, as they all looked at Dan in confusion for his outburst.  
I just giggled behind the back of my hand and dug in.

________________________________________

"Alright, now just lean back" Tyler instructed me, allowing me to lean backwards until my head was nestled on his lap. It was about an hour after breakfast had been served, and Tyler had done his best to make something akin to a styling chair with what he had, which honestly was just two chairs situated very close to one another. His legs were quite soft as I nestled my head into a comfortable position, which certainly was more comfortable than the muscled version that my former boss had.  
Almost like it was done on purpose, his sweet scent seemed to float around in the air as he gently brushed my hair, which lulled me into a sense of security.  
"So, do you have any specific plans for later today?" Tyler asked me, clearly trying to make small talk in the silence. I giggled a little from his lap, his words reminding me of an awkward hair dresser that was trying their best.  
"Well, Connor said we could go and get another cloak" I mumbled aloud, and I could spy his head nodding slightly as he listened. "I don't know about the others though. They might already be sick of me after all"  
Tyler chuckled, and I could feel the way it made his body move me up and down. He honestly seemed to be a happy guy through and through, and I honestly had to admit that it was a very refreshing thing to finally someone who was genuinely like that.  
"Man, if only I was as popular with men as you were" He laughed to himself, busying himself with a kind of conditioner. As he gently rubbed the liquid through my hair, I took particular note of what he had said to me. As popular with men as I was...  
"Tyler, are you gay?" I asked him, tilting my head back to look him in the eye. I seemed to interrupt his hair massaging, as he paused abruptly with that and giggled down at my curious eyes.  
"I'm very happy, yes" Tyler teased, gently easing my head back down to it's original position. He could spy that I rolled my eyes at his joke, which just made him giggle a little more. "Yes, I am into men. Not all men mind you, but men do interest me romantically"  
"Neat" I responded honestly, smiling up at the roof. "I thought that I was the only one"  
His brush paused for a brief moment, in my hair. I tiled my head as far back as I could to see if he was mad, but he just seemed to have a face that said that he didn't expect the answer.  
"Oh, the boys are going to be upset when they hear that" Tyler said, laughing nervously to himself.  
"Oh! Oh no, I'm not fully gay!" I said quickly, understanding the confusion. He had thought that I was only into females, which I guess I couldn't fault him for, as I hadn't exactly explained everything. "I meant to say that I am bisexual, not that I am into women only"  
"Oh! Oh, okay" Tyler said, nodding his head slowly with the new information. "You are so brave"  
"How so?" I asked, trying to tilt my head back up to look at him again. He just smiled softly as he tilted my head back down, before going on to explain what he had meant.  
"Most Bisexuals are not viewed nicely by a lot of people" Tyler explained, putting the brush down and running some kind of lotion through my hair as he talked. "A lot of religious people see it as wrong, and some gays see it as someone being on the fence rather than being open"  
"Oh" I absentmindedly responded, most of my brain thinking about whether people at Hyperion had such a reaction to me. No, I couldn't remember anyone having that reaction...  
Then again, it would have gone badly if they had started to be rude to the bodyguard of one of the most important people in Helios.  
"What about you?" I asked, tilting my head slightly to look better at him. "What's your opinion on bi people?"  
"Oh hun, it doesn't matter to me who they're into" Tyler said, gently tilting my head back to where it was earlier. Man, he must be sick and tired of me doing that by now. "If they're nice and polite, then I'll love them all the same"  
I felt so much happier with that response, relaxing even more in his grip. I could feel him start to do something with a curling iron, but I left it all up to him.  
"Is there anyone else here who is bi? Or gay?" I asked curiously, thinking about the men in the motel. If any of the men I had a crush on were gay, I would know to leave them well alone in romantic terms.  
"Connor and Troye are also gay, don't think the rest are anything but straight" Tyler mentioned, sometimes twisting my hair a particular way with the curling iron. "Why? Are you interested in them?"  
"If they aren't into women, then I won't make any moves on them. That's just not right"  
"I agree. I've seen a sort of similar situation at some bars, where some rude men try to hit on lesbian women"  
"Yeah, those guys are rude as all hell" I agreed. I saw Tyler nodding his head along with him, my head still craned in his lap.  
"Alright, it should be done now" Tyler said, placing his hands on his hips triumphantly. He gently gave the bottles and hair brush he had used a bit of a shove to move them out of the way for the chairs, before putting his hands on my shoulders to catch my attention. "If you sit up, you should be able to see it now"  
I sat up as he suggested, and I saw my hair bob up and down gently at my right side. He had styled my hair into one giant curl, draping over my right shoulder onto my chest. I liked it, so much so that I ran a single hand down the curl until the end of the locks.  
"So, are you into any of the men here? Just curious" I asked him, fiddling with the hair that he had made.  
He made a adorable noise that was a mix between a giggle and a chuckle, covering his mouth as a light red shade started to colour his cheeks.  
"I used to think that Dan was pretty cute, 'til I learnt he was into girls" Tyler said, adoring rubbing his hands through his hair in a small sense of embarrassment. "How about you? Who do you find cute?"  
I pondered the question for a while, thinking over the men. While Mark, Jack and PJ were certainly attractive in terms of muscle growth and while I loved Chris and Phil's humor, I certainly found myself drawing back to the idea of Dan.  
"...I don't know, Dan?"  
"Oh, my god" Tyler giggled loudly, gently pinching one shoulder of mine in a teasing manner. "That is so cute!"  
"Shut up, you're cute!" I did the first thing that popped in my mind, which was to throw back his compliment back at him like I would with some insults.  
Tyler just let out an almost ear splitting shriek of laughter at my comment, going back to pinching my shoulder and mumbling something about me being adorable. Naturally, I responded in kind by calling him adorable, minus the pinching because I was afraid I would hurt him if I did so.  
I think we were there for quite a while.

 


	14. Lips of an angel

"Argh! Come on!"  
I raised my head from my notepad, the slightly unfamiliar voice distracting me from my song writing. It was definitely Ally's voice, with a hint of an echo as if she was in the bathroom directly across from my room.  
...I wondered what she was doing in there. I remember hearing her say to Mark that her heat was finished, so she couldn't be looking for more suppressants.  
Both out of curiosity and concern for her wellbeing, I placed my notepad away and made plans to head to the bathroom.  
When I opened the door to my room, I saw Tyler enter his room right next to mine. His hands were full of his styling tools, a satisfied smile on his face. He had likely finished styling her hair, so that wasn't it.  
The door to the bathroom was half open, and I could partially see Ally fumbling with something on her left hand.  
Even if Ally hadn't told Mark that her heat was done, I likely could have noticed it the moment I smelled a scent come off her. She smelled like scented candles, quite soft for an Alpha. Most people, if they were Alpha, had things akin to meaty flavours or some strong kind of herb that overpowered everything.  
I slowly opened the door in the hopes that I wouldn't startle her, and she turned around quite quickly when she heard my footsteps. She gave me an apologetic smile already, gently moving the giant curl of hair that draped over her right shoulder to look at me better.   
"Sorry Troye, did I disturb you with my yelling?" She apologised with a small amount of a nervous giggle in her voice, still fumbling with the item in her right hand. "I'll try to keep it down"  
"You didn't really disturb me" I assured her, seeing her relax just a bit with that admission. She almost seemed like she was trying to hide the item behind her back, which prompted me to keep talking. "I was just wondering what you would need in the bathroom"  
She realised she couldn't keep hiding her item behind her back and she instead moved it out towards me to show what it was. It was a stark white bandage, one that was slightly ruffled and crumpled because she had tried to use it but had failed. I assumed it was because she had tried to bandage her left hand, but she likely didn't have much experience doing so with just a single hand.  
"I wanted to change the bandage on my hand, but it's harder to do than I had expected. Hence the groans and grumbles of frustration" Ally said, tilting her head at the bandage as she spoke. Ah, it seemed that I was right. "I didn't mean to hide it from you or anything, I just didn't really want to bother you"  
"Want me to help you?" I asked her, holding out my hand as a way to take the bandage. She looked a little unsure with just shoving her problems onto me, but I just did my best to smile softly at her to show I was fine with it. "Hey, don't worry so much about it. I owe it to you for saving me, Tyler and Connor a couple of days ago"  
She gained a smile in response to my own, and she nodded happily while placing the bandage in my waiting hand. She sat down nearby on the lid of the toilet, and she waited patiently as I sat on the ground in front of her and motioned for her hand. She obliged quite happily, her cut palm facing towards the roof of the bathroom.  
She had at least successfully managed to take off the previous bandage, the glaringly red cut staring out at both me and her.  
"You're lucky it didn't get infected" I commented, peering closer at it. I gently pressed against a side of the cut that didn't look all that raw, and she didn't flinch in the slightest. "Does it hurt at all?"  
"Only when I try to use my left hand" She answered, looking at it like it was an annoyance more than an actual injury. "I hope it heals soon, it messes with aiming guns and lifting things"  
I gave the actual cut a precautionary poke, her hand contracting slightly in pain along with a slight change in her facial expression. I looked up at her face to see if I could spot anymore changes, but she wasn't looking at me, her attention still caught in a miffed expression towards her cut.  
...Could I trust her with my power? Nearly everyone else in the building seemed to trust her much more than when she had first shown up.  
She had so far gone out of her way to help everyone when they were in trouble, even getting herself injured in the process and risking her life in the confrontation with August. The least I could do would be to actually heal the cut on her hand, especially since she had gotten that from protecting me, which she didn't have to do. And besides, if she had wanted to hurt us, a cut on her left hand likely wouldn't have impeded her in the slightest.  
"Troye? Is everything okay?" She asked me softly, obviously noticing my momentary hesitation. I nodded my head quickly to show that everything was fine, before making up my mind about what I was going to do.  
"Yeah, I think I have a better idea to help your hand" I admitted to her, holding her hand tenderly in between my fingers, bringing it closer to my face.  
"Really? What is it?" She asked me, before she went as quiet as a church mouse. She noticed the finger pressed to my lips in a hushing motion, and she remained silent. There certainly was confusion, but she listened to me very well. I needed silence for this to work after all.  
We spent a couple of minutes simply staying there, waiting for any traces of noise to completely disappear. She gave a confused look the entire time, but respected my request of silence.  
"Now I lay thee down to sleep~"  
Ally's eyes widened as she noticed my eyes and lips glowed a light blue colour. Luckily, she didn't say anything, instead just staring in shock as I continued to sing.  
"I recommend thyself to their care~"  
The glowing grew brighter, and I gently held her hand close to me. She seemed too flabbergasted to actually say anything, just staring in awe at me.  
"When thee awake, I give thee to their care~"  
I gently kissed the palm of her hand, feeling her hand flinch slightly at the contact. The cut glowed the same light blue colour of my lips, it extending out to her fingertips and her wrist. The cut gently hissed for a second, before it started to heal itself at a fast rate. Within five seconds, it was completely healed. She pulled her hand out of my grasp, staring at the place where the cut was a moment before, now replaced with not even a single trace of a scar remaining.  
"Holy shit" She breathed, giving her own hand a little poke to make sure. Sure enough, it was healed completely.  
"Yup" I responded, looking at her face to detect any possible changes. Anyone in the past who had seen my powers reacted one of two ways, either wanting to take me under their wing simply because of my powers or people who reacted as if I was some kind of mutant.  
"Wow" She softly uttered, to which I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes. Here it comes, the part where people never stop talking about me like my power was the only important thing about me. "Your singing is awesome"  
"...Excuse me?" I asked, confused as to how that was the first sentence out of her mouth.  
"The song you sang" Ally said, raising her eyes to me with a kind smile on her lips. "You sang it perfectly"  
"Really? I sing a magical song that heals your hand and you are praising my singing ability?" I asked her, which she seemed to answer with nothing more than a shrug of her shoulders. She certainly seemed happy with her healed hand, but she wasn't talking about the obvious.  
"I've had friends who had a name that sounded like something similar" She mentioned, almost as if she was trying to explain for her own lack of reaction. "One of them was a girl named Janine Watson and she absolutely hated Sherlock references"  
"...So, in a weird way, you hate stating or talking about the obvious?" I asked her, which earned a nod to signify I was correct. I sat there for a little while, so confused on how I was supposed to respond to that. I had... never had someone react so calmly to it.  
"...So, how'd you get that ability?" Ally gently asked me a question, to which I was honestly perfectly fine with answering. She seemed to be understanding about this, so she likely would understand if I didn't want to answer everything she posed.  
"It's a stupid reason" I sighed, rubbing my hands up and down my arm. She didn't press me for the answer at all, which made me relaxed enough to keep going. "I got baptised in eridium tainted water when I was a young baby"  
"Yeah, it was pretty bad" I said, laughing curtly. "According to my parents I apparently nearly drowned in the stupid stuff"  
She laughed a bit, but quickly tried to stop herself when she realised it was a bit of a sore memory for me. I waved a hand in the air calmly in order to assure her that I was fine, to make sure she didn't think she had offended me.  
"How about now? Does it hurt to sing?" Ally asked me, her eyes obviously drifting down towards my lips. I softly shook my head, and she seemed to release a gentle breath in relief. "Well, at least I know one thing. It didn't change who you are fundamentally"  
"What makes you say that?" I asked her, standing up and offering a hand to her in case she needed it to stand up. I nearly kicked myself when I remembered the fact that she was an Alpha and likely didn't need it, but she smiled and accepted the hand. "For all you know, I could have been a douche bag before that"  
"I don't think a baby can change their attitude or how nice they are simply from being baptised you know. In the end, you always will be a kind person who healed my hand" She responded, taking the nearly forgotten bandage from my hand. "Because of those things, I firmly believe that you're a good person, no matter what things may have happened to you"  
"...Thank you" I thanked her, wrapping my arms around her in appreciation. I could feel her warmth supporting me, even more so when her arms also wrapped around me in kind. "Thank you so much"


End file.
